


Timeless

by ennui_ephemera



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Depictions of Death, Immortal!Andrew, Immortality, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Temporary Character Death, Time Travel, Void Walker!Neil, but he doesn't stay dead!, neil dies a lot in this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-04
Updated: 2019-07-09
Packaged: 2019-10-22 02:35:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 34,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17654417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ennui_ephemera/pseuds/ennui_ephemera
Summary: Neil has died more times than he can reasonably count. No matter how much he resisted, he would always be returned to the void eventually. The void, as Neil called it, was a dark and empty place, and Neil had spent more time there than in any of his lives. With no family left and hardly any time to start a life of his own, he never bothered to think of a solution to his cycle of deaths.And then Andrew Minyard came along.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> _From the prompt: Break me for Andrew and Neil_

Neil was sprawled across the bed on his back, tracing the pattern of cracks in the ceiling with his eyes as Andrew languidly trailed his fingers over the mountains and valleys of scars on Neil’s stomach. They’d both been awake for a while, possibly hours, but neither one of them felt like getting up or even getting dressed. It was one of Andrew’s rare days off from the bar he worked at so Neil was going to take advantage of that as much as he could.

He’d been with Andrew for nearly a year now. Neil arrived in Columbia thirteen months ago and spent the first couple weeks completely adrift. Since his mother died, so many years ago, Neil didn’t care where he ended up. He’d drifted directionless from place to place like they meant nothing, because they didn’t. He didn’t even know what he was running from anymore, if he was even running at all. It all seemed so pointless.

And then he met Andrew at a bar he happened to stumble across, late one night when he had nothing better to do.

Andrew was fascinating, in the way most people stopped being a long time ago. He was an anchor for Neil to ground himself when he felt baseless in the waves drawing him out to sea. Neil hadn’t felt so settled for such a long time that the warmth pooling in his stomach was an entirely unfamiliar sensation. He wasn’t sure if he had ever felt that way before, especially not about another person.

There were rules, of course. Neil didn’t bring up Andrew’s family and Andrew never asked about the scars on Neil’s back. Neil knew that Andrew had a cousin and a brother, but he had no idea where they were, who they were. He assumed they were gone, by the way Andrew talked about them in those almost-tender moments under the hush of darkness, when the world seemed a little quieter, a little colder.

The scars on Neil’s back were different from the rest of the scars littering his body. The other scars - the hot iron melted into his skin, the long curved slashes along his chest and stomach, the burn scars on his face and arms, the puckered scar left over from a bullet tucked on the edge of his chest - Andrew knew about. The first time Neil let Andrew take off his shirt and look at the scars his fingers had felt through the fabric so many times, Neil began to offer their stories.

But he never told him about the three bullet holes in his back, and Andrew never asked. Neil knew he wondered by the way his fingers skimmed past them when their kisses grew heated and Andrew’s hands started to wander. He knew Andrew wanted to know, but Neil didn’t know how to explain without telling Andrew everything, and that was impossible.

“Neil,” Andrew said. Neil turned over, jostling the arm Andrew had thrown over his waist, and faced him. Andrew looked soft like this, his edges and hard lines smoothed by the light filtering in through the white curtains. Andrew drew his hand up Neil’s side and rested it over Neil’s heart. Neil closed his eyes as he remembered the way they roamed his body last night, not as gentle as this morning but just as pleasant. “You’re spacing.”

That’s what Andrew called it. _Spacing._ One time Andrew had asked where Neil went when he spaced, but the only explanation Neil had was that he was lost in his head. It was true, for the most part, but it was more than that. Neil got lost in his thoughts, the hazy memory of his past, but sometimes he lost himself in something deeper than that, darker. Neil stifled a shudder. He didn’t want to think about the void, not when he was with Andrew.

“I’m okay,” Neil assured. When Andrew didn’t look completely convinced, Neil shifted forward the scant inches between them and tilted his head. Andrew searched his eyes for the part Neil was hiding, but Neil had already locked it back up inside of him. When he was satisfied that Neil’s yes wasn’t compromised, Andrew closed the distance between them.

And then they were kissing, something that Neil didn’t think he could ever grow bored of, no matter how many times they did it. Andrew slid his hand up Neil’s neck to rest against his cheek, directing the kiss and angling it in the way that always made Neil squirm. In retaliation, Neil wound his arms around Andrew’s head and pulled him closer.

Andrew deepened the kiss. Neil had planned on having a quiet day in bed with Andrew, but this, this was good too. When Andrew slipped his tongue in Neil’s mouth, he trailed his hand down Neil’s body, over his thigh, and hitched Neil’s leg over his hip. Neil gasped and allowed Andrew to push him down into the bed and straddle his hips.

At this angle, Neil had to reach up and meet Andrew in order to kiss him, but Neil didn’t mind. Andrew’s kisses were burning, laced with all the fire and lust. This kiss was a war, Neil pushed and Andrew pulled, but they always met in the middle.

Neil let his head fall back, breaking the kiss so he could take in all of Andrew. Andrew didn’t push Neil’s head away when Neil’s eyes roamed across his face, down his neck and broad shoulders. Already, Andrew’s neck and chest were flushed red, and Neil knew he wasn’t much better. They studied each other, eyes trailing over faces, fingers over bodies, until Andrew rolled off of Neil. “You should shower,” he said.

Neil snorted and propped himself up on his elbow. “Join me?” he offered. Andrew considered it, tilting his head to the side, but shook his head.

“I’m going to make coffee. Don’t use up all the hot water.”

Neil untangled himself from the sheets wound around his legs and pushed out of the bed. He didn’t bother pulling on the clothes he and Andrew threw on the floor in their haste last night, but he did grab a fresh t-shirt, underwear, and jeans from his dresser. The hot water from the shower felt great on his body, so Neil let himself drift off under the hot spray. A knock on the door drew Neil from his own head. He’d stayed in the shower longer than he meant to.

“I’ll be out in a minute,” Neil called. He quickly scrubbed his body with Andrew’s spice-scented body wash and lathered his hair with shampoo. He rinsed the soap from his hair, turned the water off, and stepped out of the shower.

He didn’t notice the puddle of water on the ground until it was too late. Neil threw out his hands to catch his fall when he slipped, but he missed the counter and hit his head hard on the edge of the bathtub with a sharp crack. Pain bloomed behind Neil’s eyes as his body slumped to the ground. He was already bleeding heavily from gash on his head, he knew it was useless to try and call for help. He didn’t want Andrew to see this, anyway.

The last thing Neil heard before he let the void claim him was the thump of Andrew’s footsteps down the hall, the banging on the bathroom door as he frantically turned the doorknob and pushed the door open. Neil wished he locked the door, he didn’t want Andrew to see this…

~

The first time Nathaniel died, he was twenty-three years old. He and Mary had been on the run for seven years, and it was only a matter of time until Nathan finally caught up to them. The Butcher dragged Mary’s death out for as long as it took for her to finally bleed out across the basement floor. Nathan was interrupted before he could really start on his son, so all Nathaniel got were three bullets to the back as he tried to escape.

At least, Nathaniel thought, he got to see his uncle put a couple bullets in his father’s chest before he succumbed to the darkness. 

For most people, death was the end. Not for Nathaniel. He didn’t know why it happened, but when Nathaniel Wesninski died on the cold floor of a basement, the void claimed him before oblivion could. 

Nathaniel Wesninski was a void walker. He had to spend ten years in the void after each one of his deaths until he could come back to life. After innumerable deaths, Nathaniel was used to it. He was used to the squeezing in his lungs as he tried to breathe in air that wasn’t there, used to the way his eyes strained painfully in an attempt to see anything past the darkness that blanketed him. But there was just _nothing._ Nothing but Nathaniel and the void. 

Stupidly, Nathaniel had thought that he was finally free from this vicious sequence, free from his cycles of deaths and rebirths. His time with Andrew had been the longest he’d ever been allowed to stay alive before. Usually he’d only have a couple months before he died again, or even just a couple days. For once Nathaniel had wanted to stay, had a reason to stay. He should have known that the void would never release him. 

Nathaniel’s lungs tightened painfully, and it had nothing to do with the lack of air. He wanted to scream. For the first time Nathaniel had had a life, a real life; he had a place to go home to and a person waiting for him. But he left Andrew behind. Nathaniel felt the loss keenly, like a knife twisting under his ribs. 

Nathaniel wished he had told Andrew the truth. But how could he? _I’m going to die, but wait ten years and I’ll be back to spend a couple more months with you._

Andrew thought Nathaniel - _Neil_ \- was dead. And he was. Neil Josten cracked his head open on the porcelain edge of a bathtub and bled out across the white tiles. _He_ was dead. By the time Nathaniel would be reborn again, Andrew would have aged ten years and moved on with his life. Nathaniel didn’t have any right to ruin that. Andrew deserved to find someone else, someone he could spend the rest of his life with. 

Sorrow washed over Nathaniel. He wanted what he could never have, and that was his fault. Not for the first time, he wondered if this was punishment. If the void was some sort of limbo that Nathaniel had gotten himself stuck in. He wanted out, he wanted an end. Getting second chances meant nothing if he couldn’t keep them. But he had no choice in that matter. 

Nathaniel sighed. He had a very long ten years ahead of him.

~

Neil had spent so many years in the void he began to learn a few things. First, he could control the general area where he landed - hence why he was in Columbia, South Carolina again. Second, it was impossible to land on your feet.

When the void spat him out, Neil hit a wooden crate and bounced off to the floor below. He spent several careful seconds checking to make sure each of his limbs were intact, it would be no good to start his search with a broken leg. When none of his bones proved to be broken, Neil pushed himself off the ground with a dull groan when his body began to throb and wiped his hands off on his pants. As usual, he was wearing the clothes he had died in - the first time, when his father shot him.

Neil had no way of knowing if Andrew stayed in Columbia after his death or not. Surely he would have moved if he had; Neil couldn’t imagine him staying. But before Neil could figure that out, he had to find out the date and time. Then a shower and a hot meal would be nice, considering he hadn’t had either for a decade. After all of that, Neil could begin his hunt for Andrew Minyard.

Neil knew he should stay away, but no matter how much he tried to reason with himself, the urge to see Andrew overpowered his logic. Neil just needed to find him and explain, and then he’d leave again. He owed Andrew that much at least.

The first twenty-four hour diner Neil came across was deserted when he walked in. He expected it to be. After all, there weren’t many people out at this time of night and the ones that were had no use for an old diner tucked between buildings that practically enveloped it. The clock on the diner wall said it was about three in the morning, which gave Neil plenty of time until the city around him started to wake. 

The waitress was a short woman with dull blonde hair streaked with gray and heavy bags under her eyes. The wrinkles around her eyes crinkles when she squinted at Neil’s ragged appearance. She quirked an eyebrow. “We don’t give out free food,” she said. Her name tag said _Sandy_.

“I have money.” Neil’s voice was scratchy and cracked with disuse. He tried to clear his throat, but it didn’t make it much better. Sandy’s expression was dubious, but Neil pulled out his battered wallet for proof. He thanked the void that it always spit him out with the same clothes and the same old wallet with the same fourteen dollars and thirty-nine cents tucked inside. 

Sandy stared at him for another couple seconds, deciding whether to send Neil packing anyway, before she motioned for him to follow her to a booth in the corner near the back of the old diner. She set down the menus and left again. Neil made sure to keep his back turned away so Sandy wouldn’t see the three bloody holes in the back of his shirt. 

Sandy came back to the table to take Neil’s order. Neil pointed to one of the items on the menu and nodded his thanks when she set a mug of coffee in front of him. Despite the diner being empty, it took nearly fifteen minutes for the food to arrive. When the steaming plate of eggs and bacon was in front of him, Neil wolfed it down faster than he should have, making his stomach cramp. But Neil didn’t care, he was starving.

When the food was gone and the check was paid, Neil slipped into the bathroom and locked the door behind him. The dim lights in the bathroom flickered so violently Neil was sure they would die at any moment, and as Neil stepped carefully over cracked tile, he could see that the mirror was dirty and clouded with age. Still, he could see enough of his reflection to know that he looked bad. 

Neil’s bloodshot eyes were framed with dark circles underneath, making him look like a bandit, or some kind of pirate. His face was dirty and thin with new and old bruises along his cheeks and jaw from hits Neil couldn’t even remember taking anymore. Dried blood was smeared under his nose and along his temple, already crusted over. His hair was so matted it looked like one big knot on his head. He truly looked like he was on the brink of death. 

Luckily, the sink sputtered out enough water for Neil to clean his face and scrub away the blood and grime from underneath his fingernails. He stuck his head in the sink as best he could and washed some of the dirt from his hair, but he couldn’t get all the knots out with just his fingers. Still, when Neil was done, it was a definite improvement than how he looked before. 

Neil turned off the sink and exited the bathroom. He could feel Sandy’s suspicious eyes on him the entire time he crossed the diner and left through the front door. Neil hoped she didn’t look close enough to see the blood on his shirt. 

Finding Andrew’s apartment was easy. Even after ten years, Neil knew exactly where it was. The hard part was figuring out if Andrew still lived there or not. It wasn’t a good idea to knock on the door, especially at this time of night, but Neil didn’t know what else to do. It was still too early for anyone to be awake and it would be awhile before anyone would be out and about, so Neil decided to leave and come back later.

It took Neil nearly a week before he figured out that Andrew no longer lived in that apartment. Neil didn’t think he’d stay, but something withered inside his chest anyway. His chances of finding Andrew just plummeted, and Neil had no idea how much time he had left to find him before the void called him back.

Neil swallowed his hopelessness and continued his search.

A month later, Neil decided that Andrew was no longer in Columbia at all. He checked Eden’s Twilight where Andrew and Neil used to frequent, the bar Andrew used to work at, Andrew’s favorite restaurant, even the Exy court Neil sometimes dragged Andrew to. Andrew was nowhere to be found. (Neil did find, however, his own grave. He stumbled over it in a small plot at the cemetery in Columbia. All the tombstone said was his name, Neil Abram Josten, but Neil stared at it for such a long time that his eyes blurred. He knelt on his knees and resisted the odd urge to cry. Years before, Andrew had stood where Neil was standing now and buried him.)

Neil didn’t want to give up, but his clock was ticking and he had no idea where Andrew could be. When Neil lived with him, Andrew gave no inclination to where he would go if he ever moved, so Neil had no leads. Instead he returned to the alley where he was reborn and kicked a trashcan. 

It was midday, and people were around, but Neil wanted to scream. He missed Andrew so much it felt like he was missing a limb, like the air had been knocked right out of his lungs and he couldn’t take a proper breath. All his grief and guilt caught up to him, sending Neil to his knees. Neil caught himself against the wall as heart thudded a dull beat in his ears. All Neil could think about was laying his head on Andrew’s chest and hearing _his_ heartbeat. He wanted him so badly Neil’s entire body ached with it.

More than anything he wanted to feel Andrew’s arms around him, his lips against his own, but Neil was beginning to realize that could never happen again. Even if Neil did find Andrew, Andrew was ten years moved on from Neil, he had a life, possibly a new family. Neil didn’t want to take that from him, no matter how much it hurt.

Footsteps behind him made Neil twist around. For a second, he almost thought Andrew would be there, standing at the entrance of the alley, called there because Neil yearned for him so badly the universe conjured Andrew into existence. But it was a stranger, and the stranger had a gun. Neil froze at the sight of the weapon.

“I want your wallet, and your cellphone. Whatever you have on you, I want it,” the man said, in a thin, snuffling voice. He brandished the gun threateningly, but it was clear by the way he held it that he didn’t know how to use it. Still, he was only standing a couple feet away, it wouldn’t take a lot of skill in order to shoot someone in such close quarters. 

Neil swallowed and dug into his pocket. The only money he had was the money he pick-pocketed and the little he had left from a storage unit nearby. His hand tightened around it. He had nothing else. 

“I said I want your money!” The man’s voice had a tinge of desperation to it, and even though his face was partially covered by a hood, Neil could see his wide-stretched eyes and pale face. 

“Look,” Neil said, taking a careful step forward. But before he could say anything else, the man pulled the trigger.

~

The void was the most familiar thing Nathaniel knew, but he hated it. He felt like he was suffocating. The thought of spending another ten years there was unbearable.

~

Neil didn’t know where he was when he left the void, only that it was cold. He peeled open his eyes to find a stretch of bright white over him. When his vision focused, he realized it was the sky and a concerned face hovering over him.

“Oh God, I thought you were dead. Are you alright?” 

Neil blinked up at the face and hesitantly took the man’s outstretched hand. His lined face scrunched as he took in Neil’s disheveled clothes and bruised face. Neil shivered in the cold and the man draped his jacket over Neil’s thin shoulders. 

“Where am I?” Neil asked instead. The man’s bushy white eyebrows furrowed. 

“Albany Park. Do you need me to call somebody, son?” the man said, reaching into his pocket for what Neil assumed would be his phone.

Neil shook his head and looked around. People milled about, slipping into shops lining the streets or walking through the frozen grass of the park. It was the middle of the day and everyone looked too busy to notice Neil - except for the man, who was still watching Neil with careful eyes. 

“No, I’m fine,” Neil muttered. He tried to give the jacket back to the man, but he waved Neil off and said not to bother. Neil stuttered a thanks and wandered away when the man finally left. 

Andrew would be forty-four years old by now, but Neil couldn’t stop himself from just seeing him again. When the void gave him the option to choose where to go when he was reborn, all Neil thought was _Andrew_. Apparently, Andrew was somewhere in this city.

Neil scanned the area. Andrew had to be close, he _had_ to be. It took only ten minutes of searching until Neil caught sight of a familiar blonde head bobbing in a crowd full of other pedestrians. Neil started, his heart thumping desperately in his chest. He could only see the back of his head, but Neil thought for sure it had to be Andrew. He took off after him, weaving through the throng of people. He stumbled into more than one person as he passed, but he barely stopped to apologize as he kept his eyes locked on the back of Andrew’s head. 

Andrew crossed the street, and Neil ran after him. He was so close, only a couple yards away. Neil didn’t notice that the light turned green until he was halfway across the cross-walk. 

“And-” Neil started, but he was cut off when a bus plowed right into him.

~

If Nathaniel was able to, he would scream in frustration. He was so close. Andrew had only been a couple feet away. Nathaniel _saw_ him.

~

Neil was in a different city entirely the next time he was reborn. It had been more than thirty years since Neil died that day in his and Andrew’s bathroom, and Neil was about ready to give up. 

He began to wonder what the point to all of it was. Andrew had surely forgotten about Neil by now. If he did get the chance to talk to Andrew again, he likely wouldn’t even recognize Neil when he saw him. The thought hurt more than Neil would have liked to admit. 

The thing was, Neil had nothing else. Andrew was the only person he had cared about, who had cared about him, in a long time. Neil had loved him, and a part of him still did, even after all these years. If he could only have a chance to say goodbye, Neil would never ask for anything ever again.

A crash somewhere behind Neil made him jump. He was just about to turn around when a hand grabbed the back of his shirt and yanked him backwards. Neil clawed at his throat, but the person spun him around and slammed him into the wall. 

Neil didn’t need to look for Andrew, because Andrew had already found him. And he hadn’t aged a day in thirty years. 

“Neil, what the _fuck_ ,” Andrew hissed through grit teeth. Neil didn’t answer, all he could do was blink at Andrew. Was he like Neil? He was supposed to be thirty years older, but instead he still looked twenty-four. 

“Andrew…” Neil whispered. He raised a hand and traced the edge of Andrew’s jaw with a feather-light touch. But Andrew’s eyes were hard, and his grip on Neil’s shoulders tightened. 

“No. No, you’re going to explain why they fuck you’re here,” Andrew growled. “You _died_ , Neil. I _buried you_.”

Neil laughed, but it came out strangled and sounded more like a sob. “I thought you wouldn’t remember me.”

Andrew’s glare could have flayed Neil alive. “You really thought I would forget you? I lived with you for a year. I lo-” Andrew cut himself off before he could finish the sentence.

“I’m sorry, I’ll explain everything, I swear.”

It was then that Neil realized Andrew’s hands were trembling. They stared at each other as seconds passed, minutes, until Andrew’s body relaxed enough that he let go of Neil. “I have an apartment down the street,” he said, turning on his heel and motioning for Neil to follow. 

Andrew’s apartment was small and empty. It didn’t look like he had been living there for very long. Andrew didn’t let Neil linger in the hallway before he brought him to the kitchen and shoved a glass of water in his hands. Neil downed it, letting water drizzle down his chin. When he was done, he refilled the water at the sink and drank that one too. 

“How are you here, Neil?” Andrew asked. Neil turned at the sound of Andrew’s wary voice. He was standing by the fridge, looking Neil up and down. When Neil took a step forward, Andrew stiffened. 

Neil swallowed and retreated. “I’m a void walker,” he began. Andrew’s eyebrows furrowed and he led Neil to a lumpy couch in the living room. When both of them were seated, Neil started on the long explanation.

It took hours for Neil to explain everything, and he didn’t skip over the details. His first life, being on the run from his father, dying, the void, and finally, all those deaths since then. By the time he was done, Neil’s voice was little more than a low rasp in his throat. Andrew took it all in without a word, his eyes barely leaving Neil’s. 

“So you just keep dying.” Andrew’s face was blank, betraying nothing. 

“Sounds crazy, huh?” Neil said, but the humor fell flat. He couldn’t stop looking at Andrew. Nothing about him had changed, except his eyes seemed a little dimmer, his face more stony. “What about you? You look the same after all these years.”

It was a long time before Andrew answered. “When I was twenty-four, I was in an accident that killed my brother and my cousin. I stopped aging when I woke up in the hospital.”

Neil blinked. Andrew was immortal. At Neil’s bewildered expression, Andrew rolled his eyes. “You die every couple months and you’re surprised that I don’t age?”

“I just can’t believe you’re here,” Neil said, his voice hushed. Andrew’s jaw tightened. He looked away and stood up from the couch.

“You can sleep here for the night.” Andrew said as he disappeared down the hall. “If you make it that long.”

Neil snorted. “You can’t get rid of me that easily,” he called after him.

“You got hit by a bus while trying to cross the street. I don’t think I’ll have a hard time disposing of you,” Andrew said when he came back, his arms draped with blankets. He dumped them on Neil’s lap and made to move away again. 

“Wait,” Neil said. He didn’t want Andrew to go, not after he just got him back. Andrew hadn’t touched him since he dragged Neil to his apartment, and Neil ached for his warmth. For a moment, it looked like Andrew would reach for him. He must thought better of it because instead of drawing closer, he turned around and went back down the hall. When the bedroom door closed with a quiet thud, Neil’s throat tightened. 

Neil squeezed his eyes shut. He wanted Andrew to come back, he wanted to feel Andrew’s hands as he pulled Neil closer. But there was a large crevice between him and Andrew, cracked open by Neil’s death and separation for thirty years, and Neil wasn’t sure he’d be able to bridge it. He didn’t think he’d even have the time to.

When Neil woke up the next morning, Andrew was gone. Neil rubbed his eyes and wandered into the kitchen. He found a note on the table in Andrew’s messy scrawl that said he’d gone to get groceries and that he’d be back soon. There was no indication that he wanted Neil to leave, so Neil didn’t. 

Neil decided to take a shower since he didn’t have time to last night. By the time he toweled himself dry, Andrew was back, his arms laden with bags full of food. Neil quietly helped him unpack all of it, but Andrew barely had any time to stay before he had to get ready for work. 

Neil didn’t know if Andrew was avoiding him or not. If he was, he didn’t understand why Andrew didn’t just tell him to go. They skirted around each other like repelling magnets, trading stilted words whenever they absolutely had to. For the most part, Andrew left Neil alone. Neil had missed him so much, and now that he was back, it still felt like Andrew wasn’t there at all.

After three days of quiet, Neil couldn’t stand the silence anymore.

“Andrew, if you want me to go, I’ll go. All you need to do is tell me to leave,” Neil said, his voice stiff. Anxiety swirled in his stomach when Andrew said nothing at first. The air between them was tense, and when Andrew turned around and faced Neil, his face guarded, the tension was so thick Neil swore a knife could cut it.

Neil didn’t want to go. Even with Andrew being so distant and shielded, the thought of never seeing him again drove a knife through his heart. It was worse than all of his deaths, all of the time spent in the void. Neil wished more than everything that things were different, that he and Andrew had all the time in the world to be together. Instead it felt like the entire force of the universe was trying to drive them apart.

“I don’t want you to go,” Andrew finally said. Relief coursed through Neil’s body and he just barely stopped his knees from buckling underneath him. He wouldn’t know what to do if Andrew sent him away. 

“Then what do you want?” Neil asked carefully. Andrew’s gaze never wavered. 

“Yes or-”

“Yes.” 

Neil wasn’t sure which one of them moved first, but one moment they were standing several feet apart and then the next they were twined together. Andrew yanked Neil closer by the collar of his borrowed hoodie at the same moment Neil’s hands found their place in Andrew’s hair. Nothing mattered when Andrew was kissing Neil in that harsh, biting way of his, not the time Neil had left or the thirty years between them. Andrew flattened his hands against the planes of Neil’s back and Neil shivered under his calloused palms. 

Neil missed this. He missed the way Andrew knew every inch of his body but still his hands explored like he was just learning it. He missed the way Andrew always pulled him closer, the way Andrew took him apart with his clever hands and cleverer mouth. He was so hungry for Andrew’s touch, so caught up in him, that he hadn’t even realize Andrew was guiding him backwards until his back hit the wall. Andrew pressed himself against Neil’s body and wedged his thigh between Neil’s, eliciting a groan from Neil’s mouth. Neil threw his head back as Andrew mouthed at his neck, leaving bruises and sending heat through Neil’s entire body. 

“Andrew,” Neil panted. “What do you want -”

“Bedroom,” Andrew interrupted between the kisses he bit into Neil’s jaw. They barely separated long enough to make their way down the hall to the bedroom. Andrew didn’t even bother turning on the lights, he was too busy pulling Neil’s shirt over his head and throwing it carelessly away. It didn’t take long until they were both undressed and Andrew had Neil underneath him. 

Hours later, Neil had his head pillowed against Andrew’s chest and his hand tucked over his heart. Andrew worked slow fingers through Neil’s hair, his other hand skimming the scars along Neil’s back. Neil’s body ached in a pleasant way, like when he overexerted himself during a run. It was satisfying, and good.

Neil had missed this, too. The gentleness, the softness that two people with nothing but jagged edges should have been capable of. Neil pressed his lips against Andrew’s skin, just under his collarbone. It wasn’t quite a kiss, but it was close.

The rhythmic rise and fall of Andrew’s chest while he breathed was almost enough to lull Neil to sleep until Andrew said his name, drawing him from his reverie. Neil turned his head so he could see Andrew’s face, illuminated from the moonlight streaming in through the window. His hair was bright, like a halo around his head. Andrew didn’t return his look, but his hand in Neil’s hair tightened. Worry wiggled its way in Neil’s chest.

“I thought I was never going to see you again,” Andrew said, his voice quiet, like he didn’t want to shatter the stillness of the night. Neil’s stomach clenched. “When I found you on the floor of that bathroom, I thought you were gone forever.”

“I’m here now,” Neil said, twisting so he could face Andrew better. 

“For how long?” Andrew said, finally looking at Neil. His face was only a mere inches away, and yet his expression was unreadable. “You are going to die and then it will be ten years before we’re together again. Ten years is a long fucking time, Neil.”

“I don’t want to go,” Neil whispered, turning his face into Andrew’s chest. “I want to stay for as long as I can.”

“When do we ever get what we want?” Andrew said, his voice harsh. It wasn’t a question Neil could answer, he of all people knew what it was like to lose everything. Andrew sat up without warning, and Neil had to move to prevent himself from toppling to the floor. 

“Andrew -”

“I don’t know if I can keep doing this if this is what it’s going to be like. I can’t keep losing you, over and over again. The first time was too much. I can’t do it again,” Andrew said, his voice coming out in a rush. Every word sent a spike of pain through Neil’s chest.

“You think I want to die all the time? You think I like getting hit by a bus, shot at, or, or -” Neil swallowed the lump forming in his throat “-hitting my head against a bathtub?” Neil said, his voice starting to rise. “You think I like losing everything I manage to build up, never being able to keep the only good things in my life?”

Andrew stayed quiet. Neil clenched his jaw. “Isn’t a couple of months better than nothing?”

“No. Not if I have to keep watching you die,” Andrew’s voice was resolute, dashing Neil’s hopes against a rock. Neil scanned his face, but Andrew didn’t look like he was going to budge.

“So this is it, then,” Neil said bitterly. Something sharp twisted in Neil’s stomach. He had spent thirty years searching for Andrew, only for it to end like this. “If you can’t do it, why did you ask me to stay? Do you seriously think I could just hook up with you and leave like it’s nothing? I’ll go if you ask me to, but shit, Andrew, it’s going to hurt.”

Andrew’s jaw worked. He wouldn’t meet Neil’s eyes, but Neil could tell he was angry. There was a furious wrinkle in his brow, and every inch of his body was lined with tension. Neil could hardly believe that just an hour ago he had been kissing the tender skin of Andrew’s neck. 

“You should go,” Andrew said, still not looking at him. Neil felt like the world was crashing down around him, like his ribs were collapsing into his lungs, punching the air from his chest. Once again, he was losing _everything_ , the only person who ever meant a damn to Neil. And this time, it wasn’t even because Neil had died.

“Okay,” he managed. When Andrew didn’t say anything else, Neil pushed the sheets off of him and pulled on his discarded clothes. Andrew didn’t move at all; his eyes were fixed on the crumpled sheets in front of him. Neil grit his teeth. “Goodbye, Andrew,” he said. He tried to keep his voice even, but it cracked in the middle of Andrew’s name.

Andrew didn’t reply so Neil left without a backwards glance.


	2. Chapter 2

The clock on the stove told Andrew that it was about time to get ready for work, yet Andrew didn’t move. He tossed around the idea of staying where he was, seated cross-legged on top of the counter, and letting his shift pass him by. He tapped his fingers on his knee as he thought. He could just never show up to his work again, he could call in sick or even say he was quitting and to not expect to see him again, but that wasn’t the problem.

Andrew didn’t hate his job. It was an ordinary job at a non-descript diner much like all the other diners and bars he’d worked in all the other cities he’d lived in. The job wasn’t the problem. The problem was that Andrew has been in this city for three months now, and he’s done absolutely nothing. 

He knew that he would make his way back to Columbia again. Every couple years or decades or so Andrew always circled back around to Columbia and stayed for at least a couple months. He wasn’t _tethered_ to the place, he didn’t feel an _ache_ in the center of his chest whenever he saw familiar buildings or the new ones in place of the old. It wasn’t _home_ , no more than it was just another city. He certainly was not attached to Columbia whatsoever. He just preferred to visit the graves of his family every once in a while, no matter how decrepit the stones became. _And now Neil’s_. A small voice whispered in the back of his head. Andrew squashed it. 

It was harder to be back in this city after the year he spent with Neil. Even after so much had changed – and a lot _had_ changed in the seventy years since Andrew has seen the place – it still reminded him too much of Neil. And Andrew didn’t want to think of Neil at all; the ache he harbored could not be blamed on illness, considering Andrew couldn’t get sick. 

The dim green light from the stove blinked _3:18 PM_. If Andrew didn’t hurry, he’d be late to his shift. With a dull sigh, he pushed off from the counter and landed nimbly on bare feet. It was cold in the apartment, but Andrew preferred to save money on the electricity bill. He didn’t necessarily need to eat, sleep, or even breathe, but it was not fun to run out of money and have no place to stay.

Andrew walked to the diner, and even though it wasn’t too far away from his apartment, he was still late by several minutes. He ignored his boss ranting at him as he tied the apron around his waist and clocked in. It was a fairly busy day at the diner – probably because of all the renovations done to make the old place more “modern” – but the trickle of people through the doors was nothing Andrew couldn’t handle. 

Andrew Minyard had been alive for a very, very long time. Much longer than most people, he supposed. It was hard to forget how many years passed with a memory like Andrew’s, but Andrew did his best. Even so, he knew that within a couple weeks he’d have been alive for nearly two hundred years. One hundred ninety-four to be exact. Much too long, in Andrew’s opinion. 

Although Andrew had lived for many years and the seconds didn’t pass by the same way anymore, his shift seemed to drag on. When it was time to clock off, the night sky was already dark and the autumn air was crisp and chill. Andrew was glad he brought a jacket. 

The streets were empty and quiet during Andrew’s walk back to his apartment, despite it not being very late. The dark sky stretched over him like a thick blanket, dotted with stars that peeked through the hazy light pollution. Andrew used to like to find the constellations at night, before all the stars were washed out by the harsh city lights. Now he tipped his head back and counted as many as he could see. There weren’t as many as when he was a kid, or even as many as there was seventy years ago. 

Andrew closed his eyes. The last time he tried counting the constellations, he was with Neil. And now Neil was god knows where, if he was even still alive. Andrew didn’t care where he was, he sent Neil away for a reason. 

Except Andrew _did_ care. Much like how he always circled back to Columbia, Andrew’s thoughts always circled back to Neil. Even when it had been over forty years since he last saw him. 

He tried to stay away, to distract himself, but Neil had been the burst of color in the drag of Andrew’s very gray life, and even that tiny sliver of a year they had together had meant something. (Andrew wanted to regret it, letting Neil in, falling for him. Neil’s death and further absence had torn a hole in Andrew’s heart that he didn’t know how to mend, no matter the years that went by. But Andrew never did believe in regret.)

A couple years ago, Andrew had slipped into a public library (when those were still around) to get out of the rain. He hadn’t meant to, but he found himself at the decrepit mac computer that belonged to the library searching for Neil’s name. Nathaniel’s name, rather. The search hadn’t heralded very many results, and what it did Andrew already knew from Neil, but there was a grainy black-and-white picture of Nathaniel. Neil. 

The dark red of his hair and the chilly blue of his eyes didn’t come through in the photo, the graininess obscured his freckles, and there were no scars that marked his face, but it was him. _1921_. A year before Nathaniel’s death, nearly one hundred thirty years before. After seventy years, a hundred, a hundred and thirty, Neil’s features had barely changed. 

Andrew left the library and never looked Neil up again.

A small meow startled Andrew from his drifting thoughts. He blinked and turned around to find a mangy cat behind him. Andrew stared at it, and it stared back with great big yellow eyes. 

“Go away,” Andrew said, but the cat didn’t move. It meowed again, more of a yowl this time. Andrew sighed and threw it one of the left-over chicken strips his manager convinced him to take home. The cat blinked at him with its unnatural eyes, snatched the chicken strip up in its mouth, and darted into some nearby bushes. 

Andrew stared after it before he continued on to his apartment. Maybe tomorrow he’ll make a trip to the cemetery, since it was his day off. 

~

It was a sunny day, the sky streaked with only a few fluffy white clouds and the air pleasantly warm despite the winter months approaching. It seemed inappropriate considering where Andrew was going. He thought it should be dark and gray outside, stormy with a hint of rain and thunder. It should have matched how he felt inside. 

The cemetery was a lot farther than the diner, so Andrew took the bus. He generally tried to avoid this part of the town as much as possible. No matter how much it had changed, everything still reminded him of Neil. 

At least the entrance to the cemetery still looked the same. Aside from the shiny iron-gate fencing it in, it looked untouched. The fields were green and lively, pockmarked by various marble headstones. The newer tombstones were closer to the front, Aaron and Nicky’s graves were in the back, shaded by large, knotted oak trees that had been planted sometime in the late 1970’s. Not a lot of people chose to be buried anymore, there just wasn’t enough room, but the city took good care of the land already reserved for the dead. 

It was bright, sunny out. Not a lot of people were milling around the paved pathways in between the fields of graves, so Andrew would have plenty of privacy. And yet he couldn’t quite make himself walk past the gate. He had walked these paths many times before, and he knew exactly where his family was buried, but every time Andrew thought about entering the graveyard, something stopped him. 

It might have been because Neil was in there too, or at least some iteration of him was. It had been over seventy years since that day, but Andrew still remembered Neil’s death oh so clearly. He remembered Neil’s sharp yell, cut suddenly short, the loud thud, and Andrew’s pounding heart as he ran to the bathroom. Most of all, he still remembered the keen panic that tore its way through his body when he found Neil bleeding out on the floor, the showerhead still dripping water. 

It was stupid. Neil came back. He didn’t stay dead, but Andrew never wanted to go through that again. He could never watch Neil die and just be okay with it afterwards. Still, he would be lying to himself if he said he didn’t miss his mouthy red-head with every inch of his being. 

Andrew stared out past the white marble headstones, the flowers and photographs adorning each grave, and turned away. 

~

The cat was waiting outside Andrew’s apartment when he got back. Andrew glared at it, but the cat just blinked its yellow eyes and swished its fluffy tail. Now that it wasn’t obscured by the dark, Andrew could see that it wasn’t even that old, but its gray fur was clumped and mangy and one of its ears had a chunk bitten out of it. The cat twitched its whiskers expectantly. 

“Go away,” Andrew said. “I don’t have any more chicken for you.”

The cat meowed and batted at Andrew’s shoes. When he didn’t react, it twined itself around his ankles, nearly making Andrew trip. Andrew cursed and caught himself on the door before he could fall face first into the “welcome” mat. The cat didn’t look the least bit guilty. 

Scowling, Andrew unlocked the door and pushed it open to reveal his empty apartment. Before he could get inside and close the door again, the cat streaked past his feet and darted into the dark apartment. Andrew snarled and kicked the door closed. 

The cat was a good hider, even when Andrew’s apartment was completely bare except for a mattress and a couple blankets. Andrew found the mangy thing hiding behind the shower curtains in the bathroom. He briefly debated turning on the water and flushing it out, but the cat gave him an inquisitive _meow?_ and Andrew decided to leave it be for the time being. 

“One night,” Andrew said, wondering why he was talking to a cat. “You get one night and then I put you back outside.”

Three days passed and Andrew came back with his arms laden with bags of cat food and litter. He’d even gotten two food dishes and a dumb toy he only bought because it was discounted. He didn’t need much; the cat was only staying through winter after all. Then Andrew would release it back into the wild and he’d sell everything and get ready to move on again. 

The cat did have its benefits, Andrew could begrudge it that. It was easier to get out of bed everyday when he had an animal to feed and look after, and when it grew cold at night the cat was a small heater curled up next to Andrew’s side. The bed the cat doesn’t use and the toys scattered around made the apartment seem a little less empty. Andrew had to take it to the vet to get shots and the mats cut out of its fur, but otherwise the cat was easy to care for. 

Suddenly, Andrew’s life seemed a little less gray.

~

Eden’s Twilight had barely altered since the last time Andrew had visited the night club. Neon lights flickered and flashed, cascading errant shadows on the walls and the frenzied bodies dancing to the loud music pulsing through the nightclub like a sickening, heavy heartbeat. Inside, the music smothered every thought in Andrew’s head; but as soon as he stepped outside the music was dulled to a muffled beat, low vibrations Andrew felt from where his back was pressed against the wall. From around the corner, Andrew could see the line queued up outside, black-clad bodies adorned with chains and buckles milling around and waiting for admittance as the club was at its peak for the night.

Even after three hours spent amidst the sweaty bodies and crushing music, Andrew wasn’t entirely sure why he was here. Eden’s was an easy place to find someone to hook up with if needed, but the thought of his hands on someone, or someone’s hands on _him_ put him on edge. Andrew had needs, but he attended to them with a quick hand, no one else was needed. He hadn’t truly been with anyone else since Neil left, nor did he want to, but Andrew had entertained the thought for the past couple days, juggling it around in his head before catching it and dissecting it from every angle. This could be good for him, if only to blow off some steam. 

Andrew dropped his finished cigarette and ground it out with his foot. He bought new clothes for tonight, tight black jeans with rips up and down the legs and a mesh black shirt that clung to his arms and shoulders. He kept his armbands on, and he still had the same black boots he always wore, familiar and comfortable on his feet. Andrew stuffed his carton of cigarettes in his back pocket, secured against his wallet, and turned to go back inside. 

A loud pop and a crash, nearly swallowed by the crunch of the bass inside, made Andrew pause. He was alone when he stepped in the alley, but someone could have followed him out the door since left it open a crack so he could get back in. Andrew expected to find a drunk couple, maybe someone who stumbled out alone, but instead the sight made his stomach drop. 

It was dark in the alley, and the figure was shrouded in a gloom, but Andrew had no problem seeing who it was. Andrew could never forget a face, especially not this one, with the scars and the blue eyes Andrew had tried so hard to forget after so fervently committing to memory. 

Neil Josten was doubled over a trashcan, his chest heaving like he’d run a long distance. When he tried to move, the metal trashcan tipped over with another loud crash. Andrew stood frozen as Neil stumbled around, looking as his he was trying to regain the use of his legs. Behind them, the noise attracted the attention of some of the people waiting. 

That was when Andrew noticed the blood on Neil’s face. 

The murmur of voices behind Andrew snapped him out of his trance. Right when Neil dropped to the floor like a sack of potatoes, Andrew was at his side in an instant. Neil’s eyes were closed and blood dripped from his nose and ears, smearing when Andrew brushed his hair back to better see his face. Every breath he took was a struggling rasp in his chest. Andrew had never seen Neil come back from the void, but Neil never said it was like this. 

“Oh my god, is he alright?” Andrew clenched his teeth as a couple people surrounded him and Neil. He pulled Neil closer, easing him onto his lap, as his hands tightened in his shirt. 

“I’m calling an ambulance,” a girl with heavily-black lined eyes said, phone in hand.

“No,” Andrew snapped. An ambulance would only complicate this. He needed to get Neil back to his apartment and figure out what to do from there. Neil’s eyes were still closed, but his breathing was starting to even out. 

The girl and her friends looked skeptical, but Andrew leveled a glare at them. “He’s with me and this happens a lot. Mind your own business.”

With that, Andrew heaved one of Neil’s arms over his shoulders and pulled him up. No one protested when Andrew passed by, Neil’s feet trailing weakly behind, more dragging than walking. 

It was a long walk back to the apartment and at some point Neil passed out entirely, forcing Andrew to hook one arm under his legs and the other under his shoulders and carry him like that. He couldn’t take the bus or hail a taxi, it would look too suspicious with Neil unconscious and bloody. When Andrew got to his apartment, he shifted and eased Neil down so he could free up a hand to unlock and open the door. The cat greeted Andrew when he walked in, still carrying Neil in his arms, but Andrew ignored it and deposited Neil on the mattress in his bedroom.

Something was wrong, it didn’t take a genius to figure it out. When Neil explained how he left the void he mentioned that sometimes he crash-landed, but he’d be up and walking within minutes. This was different; there was too much blood and Neil had barely stirred since he appeared in the alley. 

Andrew sat cross-legged on the floor next to the mattress. This couldn’t be real. Andrew hadn’t seen Neil for years, decades, what was the likelihood of Neil popping up in the exact spot Andrew was in? Neil had to have done this on purpose. Even after Andrew told him to stay away, Neil was here and it hurt all over again. He thought he should be angry, but all he felt while he looked at Neil’s prone form on his mattress was shock, and below that, the slow throb of fear and hurt. Andrew took a deep, steadying, breath and shoved all of that away. They were unhelpful and unnecessary. 

When it was clear that Neil wouldn’t wake up for a while, Andrew fetched a wet washrag and cleaned the crusted blood off his face, careful around the bruises and cuts. Under the dirt, Neil’s face was gaunt and battered. His skin shone pale and sickly from the ceiling light. His clothes were dirty and stained with blood, the same blue shirt and raggedy jeans Neil was wearing when Andrew found him in New York over forty years ago. The entire time Andrew cleaned him, Neil barely moved. 

Andrew sat there, his arms wrapped loosely around his legs with his chin propped up on his knees, hardly daring to blink in case Neil disappeared or died again, while he waited for Neil to wake. If he woke. At some point the cat wandered in and pressed its body to Andrew’s back, blinking suspiciously at Neil from under Andrew’s elbow. 

By the time Neil’s eyes cracked open, the sky outside was already lightening to a dull gray. Neil blinked a couple times, his brows furrowed in confusion or pain. He shifted on top of the sheets, turning his head until his gaze caught on Andrew. Neil froze, his eyes widening. Andrew wasn’t expecting it when Neil jolted upright, clawing at the sheets around him and kicking them off.

Andrew moved and caught Neil’s arm but Neil yanked it away. “I need to go,” he said, looking wildly around the room with his too-wide, frightened eyes. “I didn’t mean to come here, I promise. I’m leaving now.”

“Neil,” Andrew said through his teeth. The name tasted bittersweet in his mouth. “Lay down before you hurt yourself.”

Neil stopped struggling, but he wouldn’t meet Andrew’s eyes. “You told me to go,” he whispered. 

“And now I’m telling you to stay,” Andrew said before Neil moved to leave again. He didn’t mean to say the words, but he realized they were true. He’d rather cut off his own hand than watch Neil walk out the door again. Neil’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. Finally, he dragged his gaze up to Andrew’s, his eyes haunted and bloodshot, like some of the blood vessels had burst. 

Neil sunk back against the mattress, his body deflating. “I don’t know what’s happening to me,” he said, his voice a thin thread between them. Andrew grasped it. 

“Why are you here?” It was the one question that had been circling his brain since Neil first showed up in the alley. Seeing him again after so long hurt, but seeing him weak, _dying_ was worse. This was what he had been trying to avoid, this was why he had sent Neil away and spent the last forty years alone. 

Neil shook his head. His face scrunched up, the way it did when he was thinking hard about something. “I’m regressing,” he said. When Andrew said nothing, he took a breath and continued. “I can’t control where I’m reborn anymore. It’s like I’m going backwards. Before this it was Chicago, before that it was the city we last met…New York, I think. And that’s not just it. I’m reliving all of my deaths in the void, over and over again until I’m reborn again. It hurts, Andrew. It hurts so much.”

Neil broke off with a sudden coughing fit. His nose started to bleed again so Andrew passed him the towel he used to clean him up. His hand brushed Neil’s when Neil grabbed for the towel. The touch of his skin sent a jolt down Andrew’s spine. He allowed himself to linger for a few more moments than strictly necessary. 

“Do you know what caused this?” Andrew pressed when Neil’s nose stopped bleeding. 

Neil shook his head, chewing his lip. There was a furious wrinkle between his brows. “I don’t know. When I was reborn before, it felt like being pulled through a long tube. Now it’s all jerky, like I’m being yanked around in different directions until it spits me out somewhere. And it gets worse with every death. I don’t know how many more times I can keep doing this.”

Andrew clenched his jaw, grinding his teeth together until it hurt. Now that Neil was here again, Andrew wasn’t sure he would be able to let him go. But if Neil were dying, and was going to _stay _dead…Andrew didn’t want to think about it.__

__“Get some sleep, Neil.” Andrew said, despite the sun sneaking over the horizon. “We’ll figure this out when you wake up.”_ _

__Neil eyed him warily and didn’t move. “Are you going to leave?”_ _

__The smart thing to do was leave, find another city and a new apartment. It wasn’t likely Neil would find him a fourth time, at least not before he passed completely. Andrew wouldn’t have to live through Neil’s death again. But he couldn’t leave Neil like this, not when he was scared and in so much pain. Andrew didn’t care if he got hurt anymore; he wanted Neil, and he wanted to be with him. For as much time as he had left._ _

__“No,” Andrew promised. Neil didn’t respond but his eyes started to droop shut. Andrew stayed where he was until Neil’s breathing evened and slowed, then he got up and shooed the cat from the room, closing the door on his way out._ _

__~_ _

__Neil slept for nearly the entire day. Andrew tried to busy himself around the apartment while he waited for Neil to wake, but there wasn’t much to do. He’d already cleaned the kitchen and loaded all the dishes, and the floors didn’t need to be swept. He did the laundry and played with the cat for a while, taunting it with a toy before snatching it out of reach when it leapt._ _

__After Andrew folded his clothes and put the neatly in the closet, he was starting to feel cooped up. It was an unpleasant sensation; one Andrew didn’t feel very often. He’d spent hours, days, weeks lying in bed in small apartments just like this one as he let the seconds wash over them like they meant nothing. Because really, they didn’t. But now every minute spent pacing in the living room and resisting to check if Neil was still breathing was another scratch under his skin. He was antsy and anxious, like he was when he needed a cigarette._ _

__Andrew decided to go to the grocery store._ _

__He debated leaving a note for Neil in case he woke up to Andrew’s absence, but ultimately decided against it. He made a promise to Neil, and if Neil knew him at all he’d know that Andrew would keep it. Grabbing his wallet and cigarettes, Andrew left the apartment in a rush._ _

__It was a Thursday afternoon, so Andrew didn’t expect the grocery store to have very many people shopping. Andrew preferred it, he hated walking around, picking what he needed and dropping it in the cart, when the aisles and check-out lines were crowded. He liked to buy his groceries in peace. As he walked up and down the aisles, absentmindedly placing items in his cart, Andrew was thinking about Neil._ _

__Neil, bloody in the alley. Neil, reliving his deaths over and over. Neil, closing the door behind him in New York. Neil, bleeding to death in a porcelain bathroom. Andrew shook his head. This wasn’t helping._ _

__When he got home, Neil was still asleep. He’d rolled over onto his side, no longer on his back like a corpse but his body curled like a cat. With a flash Andrew remembered how nicely Neil had fit against him when he slept like that, his back pressed to Andrew’s chest, Andrew’s arm thrown over his waist, pulling him closer, their legs tangled up between them. Andrew pushed the thought away and retreated to the kitchen to unpack the food he bought._ _

__

__When Neil woke, Andrew found him sitting up against the pillows, the blankets draped around his waist. He looked up when Andrew poked his head in the room, his face relaxing._ _

__“I have food,” Andrew said. He felt unsure of himself, even though he had lived with Neil for a year and knew what he liked to eat, what he didn’t. He knew everything about Neil, but Andrew still felt like he was treading unfamiliar water._ _

__“Can I take a shower first? I feel like shit.”_ _

__“You look like shit,” Andrew said so he could hear Neil’s faint snort. When it never came, Andrew moved from the doorway to the closet where he kept his clothes. He nudged the dirty shirts and jeans away with his foot until he found a clean pair of sweats and a dark hoodie he’s had for years. He grabbed a spare towel and threw them at Neil. “The bathroom’s down the hall. Don’t slip.”_ _

__While Neil was showering, Andrew heated up some soup in the kitchen. He wasn’t very hungry himself, so he nibbled on a chocolate bar and waited for Neil to get out of the shower. He’d have to call in for work today, maybe tomorrow too, at least until Neil was feeling better. It wasn’t a problem, Andrew had rarely called in sick from work so his manager should let this slide._ _

__Neil looked better after the shower; his skin was clean and his hair was shining, water droplets still clinging to the ends. The sweats were a bit short and the hoodie was too big around the shoulders, the sleeves falling over his knuckles. Andrew had to tear his eyes away from the exposed skin of Neil’s clavicle where the fabric had slipped. While Neil was still too thin and his face was lined with fading bruises and dark circles under his eyes, it was an improvement._ _

__Neil devoured the soup. When he was done Andrew took the bowl away to the sink. When he turned, the cat scampered into the kitchen and meowed loudly by Andrew’s feet until he pulled the can of wet cat food down from the shelf, opening it and setting it down for the mongrel to eat. When he looked up, Neil was watching it with a soft upward quirk of his lips. Andrew’s heart quickened. He didn’t realize how much he missed Neil’s smile until that moment._ _

__“You have a cat?” Neil asked, scooting his chair over so he could pet the cat’s head. “What’s its name?”_ _

__“Cat,” Andrew replied. Neil gave him an unimpressed look._ _

__“You have to name it something.”_ _

__“I did, I named it cat.”_ _

__Neil rolled his eyes and stroked the cat’s fur as he thought. “King Fluffkins. Because its fluffy.”_ _

__“I’m pretty sure it’s a girl, and it definitely isn’t royalty,” Andrew said. Tired of the subject, he asked, “How do you feel?”_ _

__“Better. It doesn’t hurt as much,” Neil said. Andrew hummed and studied the slope of his shoulders, the easy way he held himself. He didn’t seem to be lying, but Andrew looked for all his tells anyway._ _

__The entire time Neil slept, Andrew had been thinking. Once he had his back safely turned away to rinse out Neil’s bowl, he said, “I’m going to find a way to fix this.”_ _

__Neil was silent behind him. The only sound was the cat’s noisy chewing and its loud purrs. When Andrew dared a glance over his shoulder, Neil was studying his hands in his lap. He didn’t look up when he said quietly, “I don’t think that’s going to happen.”_ _

__Andrew had had the hope bled out of him a long time ago, long before he even met Neil. But Andrew was tired of watching the people he loved die and leave him behind. If there was even the slightest chance that he could help Neil, he was going to take it. Nothing in the world could stop him._ _

__“I don’t care,” Andrew said and placed the bowl in the dishwasher. Neil was still staring at his hands, but Andrew didn’t wait for him to respond. He turned the dishwasher on and left Neil at the kitchen table._ _

__~_ _

__For a week after that, Andrew and Neil carefully gravitated around each other. Andrew went to work and kept himself busy while Neil wandered around Columbia, seeing what was new, what had changed. On nights when Andrew got home and Neil was asleep, curled up on the mattress, a hand tucked under his scarred cheek, Andrew would leave him be and wait in the living room for the sun to come up._ _

__On one such night, Neil wasn’t fully asleep and his eyes opened before Andrew could retreat._ _

__“We can share the bed, you know,” he said. Andrew paused with his hand on the door. “There’s room for both of us.”_ _

__“I don’t need to sleep.” Andrew felt tired the way he felt hungry, a lasting impression from when he was mortal, but eating and sleeping weren’t necessary. It made him feel better, yes, but it wouldn’t kill him if he went without._ _

__“Still, the offer’s open.” Neil’s eyes were unnaturally bright in the dark, lit only by the light falling across his face from the streetlamps outside. When Andrew took a careful step forward, Neil shuffled back to make room._ _

__Taking off his boots and trading jeans for sweatpants, Andrew lowered himself to the mattress beside Neil. He had never noticed how lumpy it was before, or how flat his pillows. But now it was all he could think of. Well, besides Neil, only a couple inches away, his hands tucked safely away._ _

__“Goodnight, Andrew,” Neil whispered. He was already struggling to keep his eyes open. Andrew knew he wouldn’t be getting much sleep tonight. It was a long time before he answered._ _

__“Goodnight,” he replied._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided to split this chapter in two since it was getting pretty long sdskj
> 
> thank you everyone who commented and left kudos on the last chapter, it really means a lot!!
> 
> you can find me on tumblr @ [knox-knocks](www.tumblr.com/blog/knox-knocks) if you wanna chat or find more andreil content C:


	3. Chapter 3

Andrew woke with his hand over Neil’s, their fingers tangled on the mattress. It was sometime after dawn, and Neil was still asleep. His skin was warm against Andrew’s, but Andrew drew his hand back and rolled out of bed, careful not to disturb Neil.

The apartment was still and quiet. Andrew passed King asleep in her cat bed, curled so tightly she looked like a gray ball with tufts of fluff sticking up in every direction. Dawn light filtered in through the windows, blurring the edges in the apartment and making everything look grainy in the low light. The hard-wood floors were cold under Andrew’s bare feet, but Andrew continued to the kitchen anyway. He was halfway through cooking the bacon when Neil emerged from the bedroom, looking sleep rumpled and softened by the same gray light. His bruises had almost completely vanished.

Neil yawned and stretched, arching his back like a cat. He rubbed at his eyes and plopped down at the kitchen table. Andrew turned away before he could do something stupid, like run his hands through the soft strands of Neil’s hair.

“The bacon’s almost done but there’s a plate of toast and orange juice in the fridge,” Andrew said. The bacon sizzled and popped. Andrew quickly piled the rest of it on a plate before he could get burned from the grease in the pan. Then he grabbed the bread and set both plates on the table in front of Neil. There was only one chair so Andrew snagged a couple pieces of bacon and toast and leaned against the wall across from Neil.

“Thanks,” Neil mumbled and picked at the food. After a couple bites of his breakfast he pushed it away.

“Not hungry?” Andrew said around his piece of bacon. “You didn’t eat last night, either.”

“Diner food is great and all, but not when it’s a day old.”

Andrew leveled him a look until Neil sighed.

“My appetite is just a little low, is all. I’m fine,” Neil said, eyeing the woodgrain of the table. Andrew set his breakfast down and reached over the table to feel Neil’s head. His skin was hot to the touch. Andrew remembered Neil’s hand against his, he wasn’t just warm, he was burning.

“Neil,” Andrew said.

“I’m sure it’ll go away. I’m just a little warm.”

“ _Neil._ ”

“I don’t know if this is it, Andrew!” Neil snapped. “I’ve been sick before. Sometimes it goes away, and sometimes it doesn’t. I just don’t know.”

Andrew rounded the table and opened the pantry, retrieving a tall plastic cup. He filled it with water from the tap and placed it in front of Neil, with more force than necessary. “Drink all of that,” Andrew said. “I’m going to the store to get ibuprofen. You stay here and drink more water.”

The ibuprofen brought down the fever enough where Neil only felt slightly warm when Andrew placed the back of his hand against his forehead. Andrew made Neil drink two more glasses of water and eat another can of chicken noodle soup. Afterwards, Andrew debated sending Neil to bed to rest up.

Neil sighed. “I’m not fragile, Andrew. I can take care of myself.”

“I know,” Andrew said and took Neil’s bowl from his hands. When their fingers brushed, Andrew could feel traces of the heat.

“You can’t stop this.”

Andrew stopped in the middle of the kitchen, bowl still in hand. Slowly, he placed it in the sink with the other dishes.

Neil stood up from his chair. He tugged at Andrew’s shirt sleeve until he turned around. “Maybe I should leave. I don’t want to put you through this.”

“No.” And again. “No.”

Neil pursed his lips. “You said yourself that you didn’t want to have to keep watching me die. If it’s not this, it’ll be something else. And to what end? Eventually ten years will go by and I won’t come back.”

“You still have time, Neil. I promised that I would help you.”

“ _You_ are the one with all the time in the world, Andrew. Not me. I’ve never had enough time. Never. This is no different.”

“So, what? You are going to keep dying, over and over again until you’re gone for good?” Andrew shook off the hand Neil still had gripped in his shirt. “Where’s that survival instinct you had before? What happened to trying to stay alive?”

“What’s the point!” Neil shouted, his voice bouncing off the empty walls. “No matter how hard I tried to stay alive, I always died in the end. I’m trying to make this easier on you.”

“Don’t. None of this is easy.”

“I know that,” Neil said, the fight leaving his voice. He hovered a hand over Andrew’s elbow. When Andrew didn’t protest, he curled his fingers in the fabric there. Andrew reached up and held Neil’s hand in place. For a brief second, he let himself trace the scars he had long ago memorized. A small tug had Andrew facing Neil. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”

“It is always going to hurt,” Andrew said. Admitting it was like slashing a knife across his skin. Blood welling up, bright red and shocking against his pale skin. Andrew pulled out of Neil’s reach.

“Andrew –”

Andrew left the kitchen and entered the living room, Neil trailing after him. When Neil slipped in front of him and opened his mouth to protest, Andrew cut him off.

“I am visiting my family.” He paused in grabbing his wallet and his pack of cigarettes, and met Neil’s eyes across from him. Neil’s lips were flattened into a thin line, but he didn’t call Andrew back. Andrew turned away and the door closed behind him with a soft click.

~

The gravel crunched underneath Andrew’s feet as he walked the path to Nicky and Aaron’s graves. He eyed the others as he passed by. The farther he went, the older they got. These graves rarely had any flowers placed on top of them, and only a few tokens remained, faded and warped with age. Weeds bordered the path, weeks of not being plucked. While the front of the graveyard was pristine, not a leafy weed in sight, this part looked like it hadn’t been managed for ages. Maybe it hadn’t.

Andrew wondered if anyone even came this way anymore, or if he was the only one. He was sure the custodians who were in charge of the cemetery swept through this area like they did the rest. But maybe they didn’t. No one was around to visit these old graves, decades and hundreds of years old. No one except Andrew.

His family’s graves were almost obscured by big oak trees, gnarled and twisted with years of growth. Leaves littered the ground, sprinkled over roots and crunching under Andrew’s feet as he walked the pathway, it was the calling of winter. Andrew found the two graves he was looking for and sat between them, crossing his ankles and pulling his knees to his chest.

The tombstones were weather-beaten and crumbling, pockmarked from decades of wind and rain. Grass had grown over both of them, long blades overgrown, and little shoots of small white flowers swayed, buffeted by the gentle breeze. The words on the stones were almost completely gone, eroded with time. Years ago, Andrew had taken a knife and tried to carve the words back in, but that too, had started to fade.

Andrew let out a breath of air. He never knew what to do when he was here. Some people talked, as if the dead could actually hear their words. But what could he say?

_I still think about what happened._

_I blame myself._

_Sometimes I wish I was buried here with you._

Andrew always stayed silent. The oak tree boughs and branches shook above him and the leaves rustled, sashaying in the wind. More leaves, brown and orange, drifted to rest on the ground around Andrew. One landed on Aaron’s tombstone, and Andrew brushed it off.

Nicky’s name was barely legible anymore. Aaron’s was only slightly better. The date on Aaron’s stone was gone, smoothed over from the elements, but Nicky’s still read 1871 – 1897. It has been one hundred and eighty years since their deaths. One hundred and eighty years since Andrew stopped aging.

Andrew rested his chin on his knees. The oak trees creaked. The leaves whistled. The gravel crunched with footsteps behind him.

Andrew didn’t need to turn around to know who it was. “You should be resting,” he called without looking up.

Neil sat down beside him, carefully settling between the grass and fallen leaves. His eyes swept over the graves, taking them in, all their decrepit glory. “I’ve been here once, when I first started looking for you,” he mused instead of replying. “I don’t really know what I was looking for. I think I was just hoping I wouldn’t find yours. I found mine, but not these ones.”

A truth for a truth. Andrew remembered the game Neil was trying to play. He came up with it in the early stages of their relationship, when he wanted to know every single thing he could about Neil Josten. Andrew guessed he still had a long way to go.

“They never found their bodies,” Andrew began, his voice filling the air. He’d never talked about it before, barely let himself think it. But he pressed on. “I always assumed they burnt to ash in the fire. There wasn’t really anything left of the house. Technically, these coffins are empty.”

Neil frowned. “What happened?” he asked quietly, tentatively as if Andrew were a wild animal he didn’t want to scare away.

Andrew swallowed. He tasted the ash in his mouth. He felt too warm despite the cool autumn air around them. “It was an accident. The stove blew up and the fire spread fast. I wasn’t there at the time, I was coming back from closing up at the pub. By the time I got there, the house was already in flames.”

The fire had been hot, Andrew could feel it all the way from the gate. He remembered the heat burning his face as he ran, feet trudging through snow. He had tried to get the gate open, but the latch was stuck. Nicky had told him to fix it a week earlier, but he hadn’t. By the time he scaled the fence and landed on the other side, it was too late.

“I tried to get them out,” Andrew continued. The roof started to cave, bowing under the hungry flames as the wood crackled and popped. “I was only about ten paces from the house when it blew.” The windows shattered, bits of glass flying through the air, sparks singeing Andrew’s face. Hot. Red hot. “The next thing I knew, I was waking up face down in the snow, the neighbor shaking my shoulder.”

Neil was quiet for a long time. Long enough for Andrew to feel something rise up in his chest and longer still for him to push it back down again. Andrew had long since figured out how to get a handle over his rage, but it still bubbled up, hot as the fire that burned that house to the ground on occasions like these. Andrew gritted his teeth and glared at the gray stone. 

“You ever died in a fire, Neil?” Andrew asked. There was an edge to his voice, one he hadn’t quite managed to tamper down.

“No,” Neil said. “But I drowned once.”

“Those are two very different things.”

“Yeah.”

Andrew sucked in a long stream of air and held it in his lungs. When he released it, he let his body deflate, easing the tension and putting it away. Neil wasn’t the enemy, he wasn’t the one Andrew was fighting against. Neil was on limited time, Andrew didn’t want to waste it with arguing. 

There was a tiny leaf in Neil’s hair, nestled between the auburn curls. Andrew plucked it out and let it fall from his fingers to the ground with the others. When he glanced up, Neil’s face was open and vulnerable. Andrew would rather die than betray that.

~

The sun was already sinking below the horizon when Neil and Andrew caught the last bus back to the apartment. The sky was cast with bright shades of orange and streaks of magenta, dark indigo clouds reminding them of the darkness to come. At some point on the walk from the bus station to the apartment, Neil had slipped his hand in Andrew’s, and Andrew had let him, squeezing once in reassurance.

Back at the apartment, King waited for them at the door. Andrew went to the bedroom to change his clothes while Neil opened a can of cat food for King to eat. Andrew switched his hoodie out for a simple t-shirt and grabbed a pair of clean sweats. Neil had been borrowing his clothes, but Andrew didn’t really mind. After a moment’s hesitation, he slipped his armbands on and left the room.

Neil was bustling around the kitchen when Andrew walked in. A small saucepan filled with water was beginning to boil on the stove. As Andrew passed by, he turned the heat down to medium and peered into the pan. Behind him, Neil rummaged through the pantry.

“What are you making?” Andrew asked, leaning on the counter with his elbows.

“Ramen. Nothing else sounds good right now.” Neil closed the pantry door with a red packet of ramen in hand.

“Is my food not good enough for you?” Andrew deadpanned.

“You know I require the most delicate of foods. I have a sensitive palate.”

Andrew huffed, almost amused. He was glad Neil was actually eating. “Do you need more ibuprofen?”

Neil’s hands stilled, lowering the ramen to the counter. “I’m fine,” he said, and began to crush the noodles with the heel of his hand. He tore open the ramen, dug out the little packet of seasonings, and dumped the crushed noodles in the boiling water. When he stepped away to throw out the trash, Andrew caught him around the arm and turned him around.

“I promise,” Neil said. “I’m okay.”

Andrew hummed. He scanned Neil’s face, looking for the lie, the crack in his mask. When there was none, he took a step closer. Neil stayed still, even when Andrew wrapped both his hands around his arms. “Yes or no?” Andrew asked.

“Yes,” Neil said on an exhale.

Both of them leaned in at once. There was a tentative brush of lips, and then Andrew moved his hand up Neil’s arm and cupped his cheek. Neil leaned into Andrew’s palm and deepened the kiss.

The kiss was slow, tender. Even when Neil opened his mouth and let Andrew in, there was no real urgency to it. Only the ever-present warmth and glow that filled Andrew’s chest when he was with Neil. They were testing new boundaries, relearning each other all over again with every brush of lips and soft sigh. Andrew had missed this, more than he cared to admit. In the back of his mind he vaguely registered moving Neil’s hands to rest in his hair, brushing his thumb over Neil’s cheek, smoothing his hand over his waist and pulling him closer.

Their lips moved in perfect tandem and Andrew’s heart fluttered a drum-beat rhythm in his chest. For a moment, Andrew felt mortal. He felt his years numbered rather than stretching forever in front of him. He was sure he could die, would die, if Neil were to disappear under his fingers or vanish when he opened his eyes again. He was achingly human.

Andrew broke away first, letting himself catch his breath while they leaned against each other, their foreheads touching. Andrew dropped his hands to rest at Neil’s wrists, his fingers still entwined in Andrew’s hair. Slowly, Andrew eased Neil’s hands away and brought them to his chest where he would feel his heart thumping like a bid for freedom. “Neil,” he murmured, his lips so close they brushed Neil’s. Neil hummed, his nose nudging Andrew’s as he placed butterfly-kisses on Andrew’s cheeks. Andrew tilted his jaw away. “Your ramen.”

Neil blinked, confused. And then his eyes widened when he remembered his forgotten dinner. Andrew stepped away as Neil scrambled to turn the stove off before the pan boiled over.

“It’s okay,” Neil said, poking at the noodles with a fork. “It’s still edible.”

Neil finished up and sat at the table to eat. Andrew didn’t know what to do with himself. Reality rushed back to him all at once. He kissed Neil because he couldn’t bear the thought of staying just out of his reach anymore, not when Neil was so close. But now Andrew felt his absence keenly.

“Do you want some?” Neil asked.

Andrew shook his head. “My palate requires more delicate tastes.”

Andrew left Neil in the kitchen to splash water on his face in the bathroom. When he was done, he patted his skin dry with a towel and ruffled his hair, eyeing himself in the mirror. He wondered if things would be different if his and Neil’s lives were switched. Andrew, always dying. Neil, never changing. Andrew grit his teeth and flicked the lights off, plunging the bathroom in darkness.

Neil was still sat at the table when Andrew walked in, bowl empty, hands clasped in front of him. Andrew’s footsteps were light on the hardware floor as he approached. Neil didn’t look up when Andrew stepped in front of him. Instead, his eyes were unfocussed, staring at his clasped hands, a slight frown tugging at his lips. He would stay like this for hours, if Andrew let him. He was spacing, something that Neil did often when they first lived together.

“Neil,” Andrew called, reeling him back in. “Are you coming to bed?”

Neil blinked, and the haze cleared from his eyes. He rose his head and met Andrew’s gaze, that pensive look on his face. Then it was gone, and Neil was back. “Yeah,” Neil said, pushing up from the chair and putting his bowl in the sink. “I’m right behind you.”

Andrew was already settled on the mattress when Neil got dressed for bed. Before Neil turned out the lights, Andrew peeled off his armbands and set them aside. They weren’t necessary, not around Neil, and it was more comfortable to sleep without them on. Neil settled beside him and Andrew pulled the blankets overtop both of them.

When both of them were situated and had stopped shifting around, Andrew met Neil’s gaze and held it. Neil tilted his head, just a tiny bit, and Andrew considered him. His eyes dropped to Neil’s mouth, the perfect bow of his lips, and Andrew leaned in. The kiss was light and only lasted a couple seconds, but it still left Andrew breathless. When they pulled away, Andrew drew Neil to his chest and wrapped his arms around him.

With Neil’s back pressed against his chest and his arm snug over Neil’s waist, pulling him closer, their legs tangled between them, Andrew fell asleep.

~

He woke up on fire, burning, his skin turned to a crisp by the flames enveloping him. Wood cracked and sputtered and snow crunched underneath him. Andrew opened his eyes to find darkness; no fire, no burning house. Instead of snow, his face was pressed into soft curls. Neil.

Neil was radiating heat, his fever returned with a vengeance. Andrew couldn’t see anything, his eyes not yet adjusted to the low light, but he could feel the clamminess of Neil’s skin, the sweat on his brow. Everywhere they were pressed together was too hot to touch. Andrew stumbled out of bed, nearly stepping on King Fluffkins on his way to the light switch.

Light flooded the room but Neil didn’t stir. His bangs were plastered to his forehead with sweat and his brow was furrowed, his face twitching like he was caught in the throes of a nightmare. His skin was pale and a sheen of sweat clung to his body, soaking his thin t-shirt.

“Neil,” Andrew called. When Neil didn’t respond, Andrew knelt down and shook his shoulder. “Neil.”

Neil groaned and peeled open his eyes. They were bright with fever. Andrew didn’t need to feel his head to know he was burning up. Andrew pushed his hair back and helped him sit up.

“Neil, can you hear me?” Andrew waited for Neil’s nod. “I’m going to get you more water and more medicine to bring the fever down again. I’ll be right back.”

Neil nodded again and Andrew went to the kitchen and came back with a cup of water and two small ibuprofens in his hand. He gave Neil the pills and watched him swallow them, then he helped him drink the water. Neil’s hands were trembling and he could barely hold the cup himself. Andrew had him take small sips until it was all gone, then he refilled the cup and wet a towel with cool water.

He helped Neil lie back down and put the towel on his forehead. Neil grimaced at the contact but didn’t try to move away. Andrew held the towel in place and carded his fingers through Neil’s hair while Neil squinted up at him with blue eyes brightened with sickness. After a couple more minutes of gentle stroking, Neil’s eyes drooped shut and he fell asleep, leaving Andrew alone to hope the fever goes down.

~

The fever didn’t go away. When it got worse, Andrew debated bringing Neil to the hospital, but ultimately decided against it. While Andrew had an updated ID, Neil didn’t, and it would be too difficult to explain an unregistered dead-man-walking. Neil’s first death had been complicated enough as it was. Instead, Andrew paced around the house, not daring to leave in case Neil’s condition worsened even further.

Neil started to cough after three days, great hacking coughs that shook his whole body. He couldn’t leave the bed at all, and there were few times when he wasn’t completely lucid. Mostly, Neil drifted in and out of consciousness.

Andrew knelt down beside the mattress and gently felt Neil’s wrist. His fever hadn’t gone done at all, and he was already losing a lot of weight. But it was one of the few times Neil was awake enough to know what was going on.

Andrew helped Neil up and walked him to the bathroom. He already had the bathtub ready, filled with lukewarm water and salts that would help the ache in Neil’s joints. Carefully, Andrew leaned Neil against the counter and helped him undress. It was slow work, and Neil was winded by the time he was in the tub.

Andrew sat on the edge of the tub and used a soft cloth to clean the sweat from Neil’s body, gently wiping the crust around his eyes and nose while Neil blinked miserably at him. “Is the water too hot?” Andrew asked, cleaning Neil’s neck and chest with slow, gently strokes.

“No,” Neil croaked and grimaced at him. “Everything hurts anyway.”

He coughed, bending over himself as he heaved for air. The cough sounded wet and ragged. Andrew waited until the coughs subsided and helped Neil sit up when he was done, keeping a steadying hand on his neck. Andrew wrung the excess water from the cloth and hung it on the side of the tub. Then he rubbed Neil’s back with soothing fingers.

Neil groaned and closed his eyes, his head rolling against the back of the tub. Andrew let him catch his breath, then he cradled the back of Neil’s head and neck and lowered him in the water, taking care to not submerge his face. He massaged shampoo in his hair and washed it out again, then did the same with the conditioner. The entire time, Neil kept his eyes closed.

When Neil was clean and there were no more bubbles in his hair, Andrew pulled the plug and helped him out of the tub. Neil was unsteady on his feet and braced himself on the edge of the counter and had to use Andrew’s arm to keep himself from falling. Andrew wrapped him in a fluffy white towel and led him into the bedroom.

Neil sat in the middle of the carpeted floor while Andrew fetched clean clothes for him. He looked on the verge of passing out, so Andrew made quick work of drying his hair and body.

“I can dress myself,” Neil said, grabbing the t-shirt from Andrew’s hands. He was still trembling, but Andrew couldn’t tell if it was because of how bad he was shivering or from the lack of food he was able to keep down.

Once Neil was dressed and in bed, Andrew bundled him in the blankets and wrapped an arm around his waist to keep the sheets from slipping off of him in the night. Neil was still shaking, and goosebumps covered his arms and legs, but he seemed to be doing a little better. In the morning, Andrew could try to get Neil to eat some more soup. In the meantime, he had to get him through the night. 

~

Unsurprisingly, Neil refused to eat anything the next morning. Andrew found the untouched bowl of soup where he left it by Neil’s bed and dumped it down the sink. Neil looked like he had hardly moved since Andrew last saw him. He was laying on his back, eyes closed, arms straight out like a soldier sleeping in the barracks. When Andrew switched the light on, Neil’s watery eyes opened and he frowned with disapproval at the glaring light.

Andrew ghosted his hand over Neil’s forehead, touching his skin as little as possible since even the slightest touch seemed to cause him pain. Andrew could feel the heat radiating off of him anyway, he didn’t need to have his palm against Neil’s head to know the fever hadn’t gone down.

“I should take you to the hospital,” Andrew said.

Breathing ragged, Neil shook his head. He opened his mouth to reply, but all he managed was a raspy groan. Neil’s face screwed up with pain that Andrew was helpless to soothe.

“No hospital then,” Andrew said. The corners of his mouth tightened. They’d run out of ibuprofen last night and Andrew didn’t want to leave Neil right then, in case Neil needed him when he was gone.

Neil had drifted off after that, so Andrew turned down the lights and left the door ajar when he made his way to the living room. There wasn’t much for Andrew to do when he wasn’t tending to Neil. He’d lost his job days ago, after the third time he refused to show up to work. He stopped bothering to call in sick since Andrew knew he wouldn’t be returning to the diner.

If Andrew didn’t get the fever down, it would only get worse for Neil the longer he was sick. He wasn’t ready to give up yet, not when Neil still had a chance. After pacing around the empty room for nearly an hour, Andrew decided that he would run to a nearby convenience store and buy whatever medication would help Neil the fastest. He needed to be quick, especially with Neil already deteriorating in the other room.

“Neil,” Andrew called, poking his head in the darkened room. King had snuck in when Andrew was distracted and was curled up near Neil’s head. Neil’s eyes cracked opened at Andrew’s approach.

“I’m going to get more medicine,” Andrew said. Neil immediately started to shake his head, struggling to get up. He couldn’t make it more than a couple inches off the mattress before he collapsed again. Andrew eased him back down and carefully tucked the blanket tighter around his shivering frame. “I’ll be fast.”

“No,” Neil said, his voice like coarse gravel. “Don’t go.”

“I am not willing to give up on you yet. I need to get you medicine.”

Neil squinted up at Andrew, his expression a pitiful mixture of discomfort and sorrow. Andrew took Neil’s face in his hands and smoothed his thumbs over his flushed cheeks and under his eyes, wiping away the feverish tears. Neil’s face crumbled. He snaked a hand from out of the sheets and gripped Andrew’s wrist in a weak, trembling grasp.

“Columbia,” he gasped. The effort it took to stay conscious and talk was wearing on him. “I died in this city twice, so I’ll be reborn here a second time. I’ll do my best to come back but I can’t make any promises. It’s getting harder and harder each time I – ”

“Stop. You are not going to die. Not today. Stop saying things like that.”

Neil just looked at him sadly. “Just in case,” he whispered.

Andrew leaned down and placed a lingering kiss on Neil’s forehead, his lips barely brushing his skin. “I’ll be back in twenty minutes.”

~

It took fifteen minutes to get to the convenience store, even with Andrew running. He nearly got hit by a car while dashing across the street – and hadn’t he reprimanded Neil for that before? – but ignored the driver’s angry honking. He shoved open the door and managed to get his breathing somewhat under control before skipping to the back of the store.

“Hey, uh – how can I help you?” Andrew turned to find one of the store clerks eyeing him nervously. Her black hair was piled on top of her head in a messy bun and she had a crate full of boxes propped on one hip.

“Medicine,” Andrew said. “Anything to bring down a fever as quickly as possible.” When the clerk just stared at him, Andrew snapped, “Now.”

The clerk set the crate on the floor and led Andrew to the medicine aisle at a brisk pace. Andrew searched the shelves, skimming over painkillers, cold medicine, and other various medicines that were useless to him.

“Just a fever? No flu?” the clerk asked.

“High fever, about 104 degrees. Shivering, coughing, loss of appetite,” Andrew listed impatiently. He tapped his foot on the ground, checking the time on his phone. He was supposed to be back five minutes ago.

“This ought to help,” the clerk said, pulling a box from the shelf. “It should bring the fever down some. Anything else – ”

“Great.” Andrew snatched the box out of the clerk’s hands and nearly slammed into the cashier’s counter in his haste to pay. When the medicine was finally paid for, Andrew grabbed the box and left without bothering to wait for his change.

The apartment was quiet when Andrew returned. Neil’s room was dark and heavy with sickness, and Andrew could just make out the outline of Neil’s body bundled in the blankets and sheets. King lifted her head and whined when Andrew stepped in, her yellow eyes catching the light from the hallway and glowing like twin orbs in the darkness. Andrew switched on the lights and took a step toward the mattress. He could see Neil’s auburn hair sticking out from underneath the blankets, matted to the back of his neck with sweat, his face turned away. Andrew knelt down beside him, letting the medicine fall to the ground with a quiet thump.

“Neil?” Andrew brushed the back of his neck, brushing away the damp hair. His temperature had gone down, and for one second Andrew almost thought that Neil had fought the fever off himself. Until he didn’t stir at Andrew’s touch.

“Oh, Abram,” Andrew said softly, slipping his hand under Neil’s clammy neck and turning him over. His head rolled to the side, limp against the pillow. His face was slack, not so much as a twitch.

He never should have left. He should have stayed here so Neil wouldn’t have been alone as he slipped away. Andrew should have been at his side, holding his hand, brushing the thin beads of sweat from his forehead. It was all for nothing.

Andrew sucked in a ragged breath and laid his forehead against Neil’s still chest. There was no heartbeat, no movement of air through his lungs. Ten years. Ten more long years until Andrew would see Neil again, glimpse the ocean in his eyes, hear the cadence of his voice. The thought was unbearable, even to someone who had lived for nearly two centuries. “I’ll wait for you,” he said. “I’ll find you. No matter what it takes, Neil. I’ll find a way to save you.”

A rasp of sandpaper-tongue over his knuckles had Andrew lifting his head. King blinked at him and nudged her wet nose against Andrew’s arm with another quiet meow. Andrew swiped angrily at the moisture on his cheeks and entwined his fingers with Neil’s. The flush had drained away from his skin, leaving him pale and gray in the dim light. Andrew’s fingers tightened over Neil’s unresponsive hand. “I promise,” he said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahh hello! 
> 
> i decided to split this chapter (again) because it is a _lot_ longer than i expected and since the next chapter is going to be kind of different, i thought it would be better narratively. that being said, next chapter is definitely going to be the last chapter! i've already started working on it, so i hope it have it posted soon :)
> 
> thank you for reading!! i've been really enjoying everyone's comments on the past couple chapters, thank you so much!!!
> 
> i also made a little playlist with a few song i thought went really well with this fic. you can find it on spotify [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/222zagmm5t5j62g5v55uqmuea/playlist/3aGe1zvBQRcENoppiFxA3B?si=5PdAZvmWRDWUtIfLsHtULQ) !


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow okay this is finally over! i'm really sorry for the long wait, but here's an offering of a super long chapter! (i did not mean for it to get this long, but it's the same size as the three chapters before it so enjoy!)

It was just after sunset in a bustling city and Andrew found himself walking down the side of a road. He wasn’t far from his hotel, a couple blocks maybe, but it was already out of view. The city had grown even larger since Andrew last found himself here, new skyscrapers reached for the sky, towering over the smaller, older buildings. Andrew imagined they would only get taller as space grew scarcer. Humanity would continue to go up until it couldn’t even remember the ground anymore.

Andrew thought he was doing just fine with his feet planted firmly on the ground.

The city must have repaired the sidewalks because the cement was smooth and unblemished under Andrew’s feet. There were no cracks or lines to step over, nothing to keep Andrew’s brain occupied except all the _change_ around him, something he didn’t particularly care to think about.

It had been ten years and three days since Andrew last saw Neil Josten, ten years and three days since Neil died and Andrew, once again, was left to deal with the aftermath of a man with no ID, no proof of existence, dying in his apartment. Ten long years and three days since Andrew began his search for a solution, a way to put an end to Neil’s reoccurring deaths. Now Andrew was back in Columbia waiting for Neil to come back, just like he promised.

But Neil was late.

A part of Andrew, what started as a small whisper bubbling up in his chest transforming into something bigger, something less manageable, began to think that Neil wouldn’t be coming back at all. Neil did say that there was a chance he wouldn’t.

Panic was a wretched creature. It was just three days, Andrew reminded himself. For all he knew, Neil had been expunged from the void and was hiding out somewhere, waiting for him. Andrew sucked in a deep breath of fresh air and held it in his lungs. He’d stopped smoking about six years ago, the smoke never would have killed him and Andrew didn’t want it to. If there was a way to fix this, then Andrew would want fresh lungs to work with.

Andrew closed his eyes and tipped his head back, breathing in the warm autumn air. The sound of traffic filled his ears and an insect buzzed around his head. He’d stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, forcing the stream of people to go around him like a river flowing around a stone.

Renee had told him that immortals were souls separated from time, a disconnect from the very thing that dictated the world around him. He was a twig caught in a stream, the river of time diverting around him, leaving him behind.

Andrew opened his eyes and continued to walk.

It was almost midnight when Andrew heard it. The sound was nearly swallowed by the hustle and bustle of hundreds of people coming and going, but Andrew’s ears were attuned to the sound. He’d been waiting for it.

Nobody noticed when Neil Josten appeared out of thin air and stumbled forward, it was too dark to see or people simply didn’t care. Andrew caught him under his arms and pulled him to the side, out of the way of anybody who might run into him. Neil slumped against Andrew, shaking with exhaustion and relief. Neil’s hand curled around Andrew’s bicep in a weak grip.

“Hi,” Neil croaked, his voice scratched to hell. His body was skinny and battered, like the last few times he had been reborn. There was blood smeared on his face, dripping from his nose and a cut on his forehead. Andrew couldn’t remember if that cut had been there last time. Instead of dwelling on it, he wrapped an arm around Neil’s waist and pulled him against his chest. If anyone saw, they would have written it off as a hug. Maybe it was.

“Hey,” Andrew replied, soft. Neil dropped his head on Andrew’s shoulder.

“Wasn’t sure if I could make it out of the void this time,” he said into Andrew’s neck. “It was close, really close.”

Andrew could have said, _let’s not talk about this here_ , or _I missed you_ , or even a simple _glad you’re back_. But he stayed quiet. Nothing was quite so simple with Neil Josten.

“My hotel is around the corner. Can you walk?” Andrew asked. When Neil nodded, Andrew shrugged off his jacket and gave it to Neil to cover up his bloody shirt. Neil nodded his thanks and pulled the hood over his head.

Neil stumbled a few times when he walked, weak from another ten years in the void and readjusting to his legs, but Andrew was there with a careful arm around his waist or a hand on his shoulder to steady him. He’d be damned if he left Neil to die after just getting him back, and by falling off the damn curb for fuck’s sake.

The hotel was mostly empty when they arrived, and Andrew and Neil didn’t run into anyone on the way to Andrew’s room. At one point the hotel might have been grand, with high ceilings and intricate paintings that reminded Andrew of the Sistine chapel that had burned down years ago. But the building was sagging and faded in places from age and years of neglect, and the room Andrew paid a week’s stay for had hardly put a dent in his wallet.

Andrew unlocked the door and allowed Neil inside. He’d gotten a room with two twin beds, in case either one of them needed it. Neil didn’t notice or didn’t care, he kicked off his shoes and collapsed on top of the closest of the dinky beds. Andrew went past him to his duffel bag and dug out a pair of sweats and a t-shirt for himself and then some for Neil. He’d brought a couple extra pairs of clothing in Neil’s size so they wouldn’t have to share, but there was only enough for about a week. The rest of his and Neil’s clothes were in Andrew’s room at Fox Tower.

Neil was fast asleep but woke with a start when Andrew tossed his clothes at him.

“You need dinner before you go to sleep. You haven’t eaten anything for a decade,” Andrew said.

“I haven’t slept for a decade, either,” Neil pointed out, frowning at the flat pillows piled at the head of the bed. He batted at the useless square pillow with the scratchy sequins that was more for show than for usability and let it drop to the floor. 

Andrew ignored that and dressed quickly, trading his black tank top for one of the old t-shirts he had carried with him throughout the years, soft with age and too many cycles in the washer. There was a hole in the collar, the threads tickled Andrew’s chin when he dipped his head down, but it was comfortable. He peeled off his armbands and threw them in the general direction of the duffel bag before changing into sweats, the hems worn from treading on them too much.

Neil hopped in the shower while Andrew got dressed so Andrew picked up his clothes and stuffed them in the duffel. After a few minutes Neil left the bathroom, steam swirling around his head, making the image of him hazy and distant. His face was still blotchy with bruises, but the blood was gone and he was already dressed in the clothes Andrew had given him. Neil sat on the foot of the bed, water dripping from wet hair, blinking sleepily.

Andrew felt Neil’s eyes on him when he passed by to get to the tiny kitchen in the hotel room, but he didn’t meet his gaze. He knew Neil was watching him as he dug through the even tinier refrigerator, and he didn’t acknowledge the frown tugging at Neil’s lips when he pulled out a frozen meal and stuck it in the microwave.

Andrew kept his eyes on the microwave, watching the plate of spaghetti turn slowly through the screen and wondering how many hotels even used microwaves anymore.

“Andrew,” Neil said. Andrew tilted his head toward him but kept his eyes on the dull light from the microwave. It beeped and Andrew took it out, grabbing the edges of the container to keep from burning his fingers. He peeled back the plastic sheet and stirred the contents with a fork and stuck it back in the microwave for another two minutes.

“I thought of you, you know.” Neil’s voice was soft. “When I was in the void and had to relive my deaths, I just kept thinking of you.”

The microwave beeped and Andrew jabbed at the button until the door opened. The spaghetti was steaming and Andrew burned the pad of his thumb on the container.

“I think it’s the only thing that got me through,” Neil mused. Andrew hadn’t heard him move, but his voice was closer than before. “I think I would have faded if it weren’t for you.”

“I didn’t do anything,” Andrew murmured and gave the spaghetti one last vigorous stir.

Neil hummed in obvious disagreement. He was close, Andrew could almost feel the heat from his body, the static between them, pulling them closer. Neil’s brush of fingers against Andrew’s sleeve, just barely grazing his skin, was a jolt of electricity. Andrew turned his head to face Neil, staring at the collar of his shirt to avoid seeing that soft look on his face that drove Andrew crazy.

Andrew’s heart beat hard in his chest, more of a fragment of a memory than an actual function that kept him alive. He turned his body so he was facing Neil fully and finally succumbed to the voice in his head whispering to give in. Andrew pulled him close around the waist, his hands rubbing up and down his back as he leaned his forehead against Neil’s. Neil breathed a sigh and curled his arms around Andrew’s neck, trickling his hands down until he and Andrew were fully engulfed in each other. The warmth from Neil’s palms was at once soothing and made him ache.

Something released in Andrew’s chest. He expected it to be like stretching a rubber band until it broke and snapped back against his hand, leaving behind stinging red marks, but instead it was the unraveling of a rope constricting his lungs, quiet and small yet a release of pressure.

It was all too much, surrounded by Neil’s scent, masked by the generic, flowery soap from the hotel bathroom, and Neil’s skin, clean and soft to the touch. Neil, Neil, Neil. After so long, finally, _Neil._ Andrew never wanted him to leave.

It was too much, so Andrew had to say, “I found a way to help you.”

Neil tensed and Andrew told himself that he hadn’t ruined it. He was about to pull away when Neil relaxed, tucking his head against Andrew’s neck, and whispered, “How?”

Andrew hummed and began to explain.

Technically, help had found Andrew in the form of Renee Walker. It had been eight years since Neil died, and Andrew was no closer to finding a solution than he was before. He was tired of the dead ends, the leads that lead to nothing, and the hopelessness dogging his steps. He was slipping back into the gray depression that left him adrift, aimless in the ample time he had. King helped, and if he hadn’t had to get out of bed every day to take care of her, he would have listened to the familiar voice whispering to him to _give up, give up, give up._

The timeless, Renee had told him, were people who time affected differently than mortals, or in Andrew’s case, not at all. Renee was a time traveler, as was David Wymack, the director of Palmetto. Wymack was the man who founded Palmetto, an institute for the timeless, a safe haven of sorts, nearly twenty years ago. Andrew didn’t believe in safe havens, but Wymack and the other timeless had accepted Andrew immediately and he stayed with them for two years until it was time to collect Neil.

“You think they can do it?” Neil asked tentatively, his breath ghosting over Andrew’s skin. 

Andrew shrugged, careful not to disturb Neil. “They’ll have to look at you first. Run tests to see if you’re able to endure the procedure.”

“But?”

“But it’s better than nothing.”

Neil nodded, and Andrew felt him swallow hard against his shoulder. He knew Neil must be scared, and maybe a little hopeful. They still had so much to talk about, a lot to discuss before Neil would be ready for a decision like that. But for now they stayed silent for a long moment, standing in the kitchen and breathing together as the minutes stretched in front of them. Andrew only pulled away when Neil’s stomach gave a loud rumble and he remembered the spaghetti sitting forgotten on the counter a few feet away.

The separate beds proved to be unneeded, as Andrew pulled Neil to one of them to share. That night, head pillowed atop Andrew’s chest and Andrew holding him tight, Neil fell asleep quickly.

~

Andrew watched the sun rise through the window. Neil was still asleep, breathing evenly and snoring a soft whistling sound. It wasn’t until the light spilled in from the window and lit Neil’s hair ablaze did he begin to stir.

Neil’s eyes fluttered open enough for Andrew to glimpse the color but he fell back asleep with a heavy sigh. Deciding to leave him there, Andrew carefully moved Neil off of him and sat up. Andrew rubbed his eyes, feeling a headache starting in his temples. He felt grungy and in desperate need of a shower. He felt like he accidentally slept for two weeks, despite not actually sleeping at all the past couple days.

Andrew stretched, feeling his spine crack. Yawning, Andrew glanced at Neil. He was still curled up under the sheets, hugging the pillow Andrew had just vacated.

The hotel bathroom was small and cramped with ornate marble counters that may have been shiny at one point, but were now left lackluster. The mirror was clear, at least, and Andrew considered his reflection, the smudges under his eyes, the weariness tugging at the lines of his face, far too young for the years he had lived. Andrew sighed and turned away.

All Andrew had to wash his body was the small containers of shampoo and conditioner and a thin bar of soap. Neil had used most of it the night before, but Andrew did his best at scrubbing away the past couple days, years, decades even. He turned the water off after he rinsed the suds out of his hair and already missed the hot water. He finished up in the bathroom by brushing his teeth and drying his hair with the last fluffy towel.

He felt worlds better after the shower, his body less stiff from sleepless nights and worrying. Neil was sitting up, groggy and with a serious case of bed head when Andrew left the bathroom. Neil blinked at him, his face creased from the pillow. Something soft settled in Andrew’s stomach as he plopped down on the bed. He felt the mattress shift underneath him as Neil moved, lowering himself so he was level with Andrew.

“Good morning,” Neil said. Andrew hummed, content just to look. The dark circles under Neil’s eyes had almost faded completely but his face was thinner than it should have been and the cuts and bruises still had a couple days to heal.

Andrew leaned forward, tired of the distance, and waited for Neil to meet him in the middle. Neil’s lips brushed his and it was as if the ten years between them dissipated. Andrew sighed into the kiss, relishing the feel of Neil against him.

They spent that day and the next in the hotel, lounging in bed and exchanging slow kisses. When they weren’t tangled up in each other, Neil was sleeping or flipping through the different channels the hotel television offered. Instead of going out to eat or making anything, they ordered takeout and had it delivered to their room. It was out of laziness and the lack of desire Andrew had to forfeit the quiet comfort he had with Neil more than anything.

They were sprawled out on the bed when Neil settled on a cheesy sitcom that Andrew didn’t know was still airing from 2074. Andrew squinted at the screen as the ridiculous characters did something ridiculous and let his head fall back against the headboard. “This is terrible.”

Neil snorted beside him but didn’t say anything. When Andrew sneaked a look at him from the corner of his eye, Neil was enthralled with the stupid thing. Andrew rolled his eyes, feeling perhaps a bit fond. The episode ended and Neil grabbed the remote to lower the volume.

“I want to see Columbia today,” he said. “I haven’t had the chance to look around the past couple times I’ve been here, and I bet it’s different than it was in 1995.”

“Okay,” Andrew said. “Get ready.”

A small smile curved Neil’s lips and he pressed a kiss to Andrew’s jaw. He rolled out of bed and dug through Andrew’s duffel for his clothes. He grabbed the nice green t-shirt and dark jeans, Andrew noted, before disappearing into the bathroom and leaving the door ajar behind him. They would look good on him.

Ten minutes passed and Neil still hadn’t left the bathroom. Andrew could hear the sink running, so Neil should be finishing up. Andrew checked the time on his phone. It was an older model from 2063, practically obsolete, but Renee had given it to him for cheap and it was more than what he needed. It was already half past eight in the morning, so they could grab some breakfast before spending the entire day walking around Columbia. Andrew slid his phone in his pocket and went to collect Neil.

Rapping lightly on the door frame, Andrew looked inside. Neil was dressed and his hair was no longer in disarray, but he was staring blankly at his hands, his toothbrush clutched in one hand and toothpaste in the other, the cap abandoned by the sink. Andrew narrowed his eyes. Neil wasn’t eyeing the crisscross of scars on his hands like he sometimes did, instead his eyes were glassy and empty.

“Neil,” Andrew called, firm enough to draw him back but quiet enough to not startle him. Neil didn’t respond, he didn’t even twitch. That wasn’t unusual by itself, sometimes when Neil was deep in the void it was hard to call him back on the first try.

“Neil,” Andrew said again. And then, “Abram.”

Neil tilted his head in Andrew’s direction and blinked slowly back to awareness as he came back to himself. He lifted his eyes to Andrew’s in the mirror. He still looked distant and unfocused. Andrew approached, careful and slow, and curled his hand around the nape of Neil’s neck. He kept his grip firm until he felt Neil’s body relax. “Ready to go?” Andrew asked.

“Yeah,” Neil said. “I just need to brush my teeth.”

~

The city was busy that morning, the streets bustling with people dressed in nice black suits, holding cups of coffee and rushing to their office jobs or people walking at a more leisurely pace, nowhere to be and nothing to do except to enjoy the warm October air.

Andrew tore a strip off his chocolate éclair and bumped his shoulder against Neil’s. They were heading down town, closer to where their old apartment was located. The apartment was long gone, a series of condos and office buildings in its place. A part of Andrew twinged at the thought. A year was not a long time compared to the lifespan of an immortal, but his and Neil’s apartment had been the first home Andrew had since his family’s farm burned down. He’d had different apartments since then, but it wasn’t the same.

But, Andrew thought, if everything went well, he and Neil could have another home to share, and this time they wouldn’t have to worry about losing it. It would be theirs and theirs alone. Andrew swallowed. Wymack told him not to get his hopes up, and he wasn’t, but it was the only solution Andrew had managed to find in the ten years he had been searching. And it was a pretty promising one.

One more day. Andrew just had to keep Neil alive until they headed to Palmetto and fix this for good. 

“Is that Eden’s Twilight?” Neil asked, breaking Andrew out of his thoughts. He nodded his head to the building in front of them. “It’s so different.”

“They renovated everything about two years ago. Practically tore down the entire building and built it new again. I don’t know what it looks like inside, I haven’t gone in since 2067, but I didn’t stay for very long,” Andrew said. Neil stayed quiet. 2067 was the last time they were together, before Neil died of the fever.

Andrew nudged Neil to keep walking. This wasn’t what he wanted to show him.

They stopped a couple times along the way, Andrew pointing out new and old buildings and Neil commenting between bites of his fruit parfait.

“Holy shit,” Neil said with a grin. “It’s the Exy court.”

Andrew sighed. “They made a bigger one when Columbia started growing in population. The Dragons don’t play here anymore, they were replaced by the Columbia Badgers a while ago. I wouldn’t be surprised if they named the team after you.”

“Why, because I’m stubborn?”

“Because you stink.”

Neil tipped his head back and laughed. Andrew had missed that laugh, carefree and loud. When Andrew first met him, Neil never did anything loudly. He hung back and stayed quiet as if he was trying to fade away. The first time Neil laughed like that, Andrew realized his feelings for Neil went deeper than he first thought. Now, it settled something inside Andrew. Warmth grew in his chest until Andrew was sure he would explode.

“Will you play Exy with me? I’ll buy you your favorite chocolate,” Neil said, his neck craning to keep his eyes on the court.

“Later, Junkie,” Andrew said. “And Hershey’s doesn’t sell chocolate anymore.”

Neil made a sympathetic face and offered a bit of his yoghourt to Andrew in consolation. Andrew accepted the tiny dollop off of Neil’s spoon without a word. He wasn’t much of a fan of fruit parfait, but it was sweet and reminded him of Neil.

When they passed the row of tall condos that replaced their old apartment and started toward the oldest part of the city, Neil grew more curious.

“Where are we going?” he asked.

Andrew didn’t reply. Neil would find out soon enough.

Identical houses with various paint jobs lined the street in neat little rows, the shrubs and trees all trimmed neatly to keep the synchrony of the neighborhood. White picket fences and wide, open windows. It was just as unrecognizable to Andrew as it was to Neil because he hadn’t been to this side of town in over two hundred years. A fat ginger cat lazed in a bed of purple flowers, its large green eyes lazily following Neil and Andrew as they passed by. With a pang, it reminded Andrew a little of King. He missed her already.

It wasn’t the neighborhood that was important. It had only been around for less than fifty years, after all. Andrew didn’t care about the houses or the neat lawns or the cat. He stopped in front of an old schoolhouse, wooden walls cracked and decaying. It leaned precariously to the side, sagging with age. The lawn was green from regularly being watered, but the weeds had overgrown and little yellow dandelions popped up in groves. It was as much of a museum on the outside as it was on the inside.

“What is this?” Neil asked, his voice quiet. The air seemed still around them. Nothing disturbed the peace; even the birds were quiet despite the time of morning. Neil’s lips were pulled down in a slight frown. Andrew could see him glancing at Andrew from the corner of his eye.

Andrew took a deep breath. “My old home.”

Neil’s eyes widened as he looked back at the schoolhouse. He swayed on his feet, as if he were about to take a step closer and then decided against it. “This?” he asked.

“Not exactly. I told you my house burned down, and it did,” Andrew explained. “The entire farm was pretty much gone by the time the fire was put out. I sold the land and a couple years later they built a school right on top. Now the place is a museum or something.”

Andrew had looked it up a couple decades ago, curious and filled with longing for his old home and his late family. He was surprised to find the school was still standing, more surprised that the city hadn’t torn it down and built something new like everything else.

“Can we go in?” Neil asked.

Andrew looked at the overgrown grass, dotted with dandelions. He dragged his eyes along the dull red paint flaking off of the wood, the clear windows and white curtains inside. A bird chirped a cheery tune somewhere behind them, apparently done with the quiet. Andrew had promised himself he would never come back here after he buried the empty caskets. He never wanted to be reminded of his life here, but so much was different and, quietly, Andrew acknowledged that it didn’t hurt as much as it used to.

Grabbing Neil’s hand, Andrew led him inside.

~

The sun still had hours before it would begin to set, but Andrew and Neil made their way back to the hotel anyway. The schoolhouse museum was mostly a brief history of Columbia. It wasn’t that interesting, considering Andrew had witnessed the growth of the city with his own eyes, but he and Neil went through every exhibit and read each placard anyway. Between exhibits, Andrew whispered stories of his family and his life on the farm and quietly admitted that he missed them. In return, Neil began to open up about his own life before he first died. They stopped for lunch at a nice restaurant after Neil decided he was sick of takeout and leftovers, made a quick stop at a convenience store nearby, and headed back to the hotel.

Andrew could read the contentment in every relaxed line of Neil’s body. It looked good on him, this quiet happiness. It made something in Andrew _thrum_ in every one of his veins, a buzzing, a sense of urgency pulsing through his body like a livewire. When they got back to the apartment, Andrew barely waited for the door to close behind them before he was pushing Neil up against the wood, rucking up his shirt with his hands to reveal bare skin and old scars, and murmuring an urgent _yes or no_.

Neil’s _yes_ was hushed and laced with the same need pumping through Andrew’s body with every beat of his heart. He buried his hands in Andrew’s hair and let Andrew take him apart before they needed to move it to the bed.

Afterwards they lay facing each other, the sheets draped around them like liquid silk, sharing the space but not quite touching. Neil’s eyes were closed but he wasn’t asleep, and dappled light fell across his face, making his eyelashes cast shadows over flushed, freckled cheeks. He played with the bedding near Andrew’s hand, plucking at the fabric and smoothing it out again. All sense of desperation that accompanied their touches was gone, replaced with the softer need to simply be near each other. A smile tugged at Neil’s kiss-swollen lips and Andrew untangled his hand and traced it with his thumb.

Neil peeked open an eye and kissed the pad of Andrew’s finger. Andrew slid his hand around to the back of Neil’s neck and brushed the soft curls at his nape. Neil shifted so he was laying on his back and stretched, raising his arms above him and arching his back like a cat. He let his arms flop back down before turning his head back to Andrew and hooking their pinkies.

“We leave tomorrow,” Andrew said softly, not wanting to disturb the peace of the late afternoon.

“Palmetto,” Neil breathed. Andrew heard the quiet awe in his voice and fought back a frown. He told Neil not to get his hopes up – that they didn’t fully know if it would even work. But.

But Andrew felt the same small tug in his heart, the fell swoop in his stomach when he thought of a life with Neil – not just a life but a beginning, and an end without all the uncertainty. This was their _chance_ , and Andrew wanted it badly.

It was too much to dwell upon, and thinking about it made Andrew’s heart ache – with anticipation and worry and everything in between. It was easier to think about the steps _before_ , packing their things, leaving the hotel, boarding the train and arriving in Palmetto to introduce Neil to the rest of the timeless. This was certainty where everything _after_ was not. This was easier, safer.

But the wonder in Neil’s eyes held, despite the hesitance in Andrew’s. Of course Andrew wanted it, not just for Neil but also for himself – _mortality_ – but Neil wanted it most of all. He didn’t say it out loud, and he didn’t need to. Andrew could see his aching _want_ to finally be released from the void after so many agonizing years in every line and twitch of his body.

Years of apathy and carefully cutting his emotions out like a tumor couldn’t stopper the flood of anxiety and dread in Andrew’s chest. Neil had made him feel, the thawing of a glacier, the drip, drip, drip of ice melting away to reveal the interior that had long since frozen over. Andrew, albeit slowly, was getting warm again. Except with the warmth, came fear.

And Andrew was very much afraid.

He could lose Neil forever. He, himself, could die without even knowing if he had saved Neil at all. Something could go wrong; Neil could be reclaimed by the void and Andrew wouldn’t know where to find him if he came back. He’d be lost, _lost._ Andrew couldn’t go through that again.

This was it. _This_ was their only chance. Their only hope for their own salvation. Everything in Andrew told him to throw it out, get rid of it before it could take root and cause damage when it inevitably failed. Although he hadn’t felt it in decades, he was all too familiar with the dangerous tether called hope, and the sinking weight it always seemed to be attached to.

Andrew took a deep, steadying breath, and was relieved to hear it wasn’t as shaky as he felt on the inside. Neil’s eyes were droopy, and Andrew knew he was well on his way to sleep. The light was already fading, taking the radiance and the brilliant colors with it. Soon it would be dark, and then it would be time to go.

Andrew no longer had all the time in the world, and he could feel a new clock ticking in his chest, right alongside his heartbeat.

~

Palmetto was unchanged in the years Andrew had lived there. It was untouched by time, like the people that inhabited it. To outside eyes, it still looked like a university, even though the school had been closed down nearly twenty years ago due to education being transferred largely online. Few physical schools remained standing, and Palmetto was one of the last to be repurposed.

The tall white and orange buildings were still an eyesore, but Andrew had lived there for the past two years of his life, and he almost considered it a home. Neil’s eyes were wide as he took in the campus. His hand hung from the strap of Andrew’s duffel that he insisted on carrying, and he took a few steps towards the fence before rocking to a stop.

“This place used to be a school?” he asked.

Andrew had explained Palmetto’s history on the train ride there. It was only a forty-minute ride, the duration greatly reduced by the speed of the train, but it was more than enough time for him to tell Neil how Palmetto came to be, and how David Wymack went from coaching a college sports team to founding a safe house for the timeless.

The real function of Palmetto was largely unknown to the general public. Most people thought it was some sort of research facility – which wasn’t exactly untrue. But Palmetto’s resources were more expansive than that, and if an immortal or a time traveler were in need of help – or a void walker, in Neil’s case – Palmetto would find a way to help them.

“I told Wymack we’d be back today,” Andrew said, urging Neil to keep walking. “He’s an ornery old man and will be pissy if kept waiting.”

Andrew led Neil to the Lab. It used to be an Exy court, and by the look of Neil’s expression – like he had just swallowed a lemon – he could tell. Neil shot him a look but Andrew stared at him blankly.

“I’ll take you to the court in Columbia if you behave,” Andrew said before Neil could complain about the mistreatment of a former Exy court. Neil rolled his eyes but stopped when he saw the man waiting for them in the lobby.

“Andrew,” Wymack grunted in greeting. He didn’t look like a coach or a director of anything, dressed in jeans and a plain t-shirt, the flames of his tattoo climbing up his arms like ivy on a wall. His face was grizzled and lined from years of life and dealing with the misfits that inhabited the place. “I hope you’re not bringing more trouble to my door.”

Andrew stopped next to Neil and inclined his head towards Wymack with a blank stare. “Don’t be rude, Coach. He has a name.”

Neil shot Andrew an annoyed look for that, which Andrew smoothly ignored. Wymack eyed Neil up and down, from his tattered shoes to the collection of scars on his face. The attention didn’t seem to bother Neil so much as it used to, Andrew supposed he was used to it, but he did shrink under Wymack’s gaze like he expected Wymack to find him lacking and throw him out on the doorstep. But despite his gruff words and posturing, Andrew knew Wymack could never turn down someone in need.

“You can leave the bag in your room,” he said to Andrew. “Then meet me back at the Lab. Abby wants to see you.” This, he directed to Neil. Neil nodded but his eyes flicked around the room like he was counting exits and escape plans. Andrew hadn’t seen him this flighty since they first met. Andrew nudged his shoulder and gestured for Neil to follow him. With one last glance back at the Lab, Neil hooked his finger through Andrew’s belt loop and let Andrew lead him to Fox Tower.

Renee was waiting for them in the hall when Andrew arrived at his door with Neil in tow. He wasn’t surprised to see her; he knew she would want to meet Neil after hearing so much about him from Andrew.

Renee’s white-blonde hair was pushed back behind her ears, revealing several gleaming piercings, five different studs and loops in each ear, and the pastel tips of her hair were cut just above her shoulders. A silver cross hung from her neck, nearly tucked underneath her white button-down blouse. She smiled when she caught sight of the pair, Andrew first then Neil behind him. When they were close enough, Renee offered a hand for Neil to shake. Neil was hesitant, obviously wary of Renee’s serene expression, but took her hand and shook it once.

“Neil,” Renee said, her voice sweet, “Andrew has told me a lot about you. I’m Renee.”

Neil mumbled a hello and dropped his hand. Renee didn’t seem perturbed by his hesitance, instead she turned to Andrew and smiled again. She reached out her arm and Andrew let her pull him into a short hug. “It’s good to see you again, Andrew.”

“I’ve been gone a week. You people act like it’s been a year.”

“It’s been a lot longer for me, you know,” Renee countered neatly. Renee, like Wymack, was a time traveler. Andrew quirked an eyebrow at her but Renee’s calm smile betrayed nothing. Usually Renee spent her free time in the 1940’s, her girlfriend’s timeline. Andrew assumed she had been spending a lot of time with her, then.

“I hope you didn’t forget you were supposed to be watching my cat,” Andrew said, stepping past Renee and digging in his pocket for his keys.

“Of course I didn’t forget about King,” Renee said. “She missed you.”

Neil perked up at that. “You still have King?” he asked, craning his neck to see past Andrew’s shoulder. Andrew had barely opened the door before Neil slipped past him and let the duffel bag fall off his shoulder when he spotted the mangy gray furball lounging on the couch.

Andrew nodded his head towards Renee in thanks before following Neil inside. For the past two years, this had been his place to stay, somewhere he didn’t have to move on from before too many people noticed that he didn’t age. Cat toys were scattered across the living room, and he had actual furniture and a room with a bed and a mattress with sheets on it. Andrew had never been able to settle down anywhere for long, it was too risky and too much work to keep up pretenses of a normal life. But this was his, and this could be permanent if he so chooses.

King picked herself up from the couch and stretched before winding her body around Neil’s and Andrew’s legs. King had always been a friendly cat, but she headbutted Neil’s open palm with particular affection, purring loudly like an engine of an old car. She remembered him, Andrew realized, and noted the quiet satisfaction in his chest.

“Hi lovely,” Neil cooed, and Andrew should not have found it as endearing as he did. “It’s been awhile.”

King meowed in seeming agreement.

Andrew stooped down to scratch King behind the ears before scooping up the duffel Neil dropped and throwing it in the bedroom. Neil was seated on the couch, King kneading his thigh as he petted her. Andrew watched them for a moment, unnoticed in the hallway, before interrupting with a small tug on Neil’s hoodie.

“Come on,” he said. “Pissy old man waiting.”

“Right,” Neil said, and lowered King off his lap and back onto the couch. 

Abby and Wymack were waiting in the lab when Andrew and Neil arrived. Abby wore a long lab coat, the white sleeves rolled up her arms and a clipboard clasped in her hands. She projected calm and support like she always did when a new time traveler or baby immortal showed up on Palmetto’s steps, and she must have sensed Neil’s anxiety. It was rolling off of him in waves. Andrew slid his hand to the back of Neil’s neck and gripped firmly. Neil twitched, leaning into Andrew’s hand the tiniest amount and drinking in the strength Andrew lent him.

“Neil Josten,” Abby said, transferring her clipboard to one hand so Neil could shake her hand. “I’m Doctor Abigail Winfield but you may call me Abby.”

“Hullo,” Neil said dully and shook her hand before slipping it into the pocket of his hoodie.

Abby smiled. It wasn’t the sweet, calm smile of Renee’s, or the goofy smile that split Matt Boyd’s face wide open. Her smile was meant for comfort. “It must be strange coming to this place full of people you don’t know who already seem to know you.”

“I have Andrew to blame for that,” Neil said without heat. His shoulders dropped a fraction and Andrew squeezed his neck once. “You think you can fix me?”

“I believe there is a procedure that may help you. I will tell you more about it tomorrow, but I’d really like to give you a tour of Palmetto and tell you more about the timeless. If that’s alright with you.”

Neil nodded slowly.

“Great.” Abby smiled her warm smile again and motioned to Wymack. “David will be accompanying us. Andrew –” Abby said to him, “are you coming with?”

Andrew looked to Neil, studying his face, the deep furrow between his brows and the small pucker of his lips. “I’ll be okay,” Neil said.

“He doesn’t need a babysitter.” Andrew tapped his finger on the back of Neil’s neck and withdrew his hand. “I’ll be at the Tower when you’re done.”

~

“There’s no one else like me,” Neil said a couple hours later, flopping down on Andrew’s bed. “But she said I’m similar to a time traveler.”

Andrew frowned, shoving around in the cupboard for something to eat. He was almost hungry. He hadn’t felt his stomach growl for nearly two hundred years and that – that was weird. It must have been some sort of placebo effect. “But you’re not time traveling at all. You live through all the years and you don’t age.”

Neil shrugged, an awkward motion from the way he was sunk in the mattress, his arms outstretched by his sides. “Maybe I do age though.” Andrew looked at him. “I mean, not in the void. But outside of it. I don’t know. Do I look like I’m twenty-four probably going on twenty-five?”

“You look the same as you always do. Except with more sulking.”

Neil groaned, throwing his hands up and letting them fall over his face. “This is so fucking weird. I don’t even know what _time sick_ means. How can a soul be infected with time? That doesn’t make any sense.”

Andrew hummed noncommittally. He’d heard the spiel from Abby countless times: Immortals were souls separated from time and time travelers were souls intertwined with it. Mortals were souls dictated and void walkers, apparently, were souls infected by time. Andrew didn’t understand how it worked either, but at least it was straight forward.

“Everything’s just so overwhelming,” Neil muttered from the bed. Giving up his search for food, Andrew sat on the foot of the mattress beside Neil and waited for him to uncover his face. “My life has been a constant cycle of short lives and long deaths for decades, and now everything’s changing and it’s just so much information all at once.”

That, Andrew could understand. Going from living in shitty apartments and working temporary jobs, moving on every couple months or years, to staying in one place and being surrounded by people who _understood_ – it was overwhelming. Andrew stretched out beside Neil, leaning on his elbow and pushing back the fringe of Neil’s hair from his forehead.

“We could look for another solution,” Andrew said quietly. Neil’s brow crinkled.

Andrew wasn’t surprised when he shook his head fervently and said, “No. This is it, there isn’t going to be another chance after this.”

“Did Abby tell you about the procedure, then?” Andrew asked, hesitantly. He wondered how Neil reacted. He wondered if he knew. If he knew what Andrew was planning, if he knew what could happen.

“A little. She didn’t go into details but she said it’s really risky and has only been attempted once before.” Neil perked up. “Kevin Day. It was successful for him. He was a time traveler, so was Kayleigh Day. Did you know that Wymack is his father?”

“I did,” Andrew said, grateful for his junkie’s addiction to Exy for the first time in his very long life. He didn’t know, then. He would never let it slide if he did. Andrew let out a small breath.

“He coaches the Foxes too. Imagine having a whole other life outside of your own timeline….” Neil trailed off. He frowned and worried at his lip. Andrew waited for him to spit it out. “Some people have two lives and I barely have one. Not one that matters, anyway.”

Andrew shifted so he was lying flush with Neil. They were pressed together from ankle to hip, hip to shoulder. Neil scooted over to make more space for the both of them and turned his head to face Andrew. “I mean, I have you and that matters. But I can’t even keep it for longer than a couple months at most.”

There was a sadness in Neil’s eyes, a yearning for something just out of reach. Andrew was familiar with that feeling too, and he hated it. He reached up, his hand trailing a path up Neil’s chest and jaw, and pressed his thumb into the corner of Neil’s mouth. “Even just a couple months is worth it with you.”

Neil’s face crumpled as he finally let his worry and fear from the past couple days, past couple _decades_ break free and overflow like a dam bursting from holding back millions of gallons of water for far too long. He leaned in close, forehead barely brushing Andrew’s and let Andrew cradled his face with one hand.

Neither one of them moved until the shadows in the room took on a different dance. It was only in the late afternoon, but Neil’s breathing was getting slower, the rise and fall of his chest dragging until he was asleep. Andrew’s hand was still wedged between the bed and Neil’s cheek, but not wanting to disturb him, Andrew stayed where he was. Until there was a quiet knock at the door.

The three unhurried raps told Andrew that the matter wasn’t urgent, but no one would be knocking on his door if it weren’t important. Andrew wiggled his hand out from underneath Neil’s head and got up to answer the door.

“Hello, Andrew,” Betsy Dobson said when Andrew opened the door. Her round face was warm and open, and Andrew was grateful to see her.

“Bee,” Andrew greeted, and opened the door wider as an invitation to come in. “Neil’s asleep, but he sleeps like the dead.”

“I won’t be long.” Betsy didn’t step inside, but she inclined her head towards Andrew. “I was actually hoping to have a word with you.”

Andrew glanced back at Neil one more time, curled around the pillow in Andrew’s vacancy, and followed Betsy outside. The hallway was empty when they stepped outside, but Betsy continued down to the elevators and out of the Tower. They walked around the green, a large grassy area edged with trees and shrubs. A few birds chirped as they passed, but it was mostly quiet.

“It’s nice out today, don’t you think?” Betsy said, watching a bird hop from branch to branch above their heads. Andrew said nothing. It was relatively warm, but there was a chill in the wind that meant it would only get colder in the coming months. Winters have been shorter lately, but Andrew still despised the cold.

“What did you want to talk about,” Andrew asked in his dull monotone. Abby was the first to figure out Andrew’s plan, and she told Wymack immediately. But they couldn’t stop him, this was Andrew’s choice and he wasn’t going to let them talk him out of it. He wondered if Abby sent Betsy to try and dissuade him.

Instead, Betsy surprised Andrew. “I think,” she said, “that it would be beneficial for you to accompany me back in time.”

Andrew blinked. Betsy studied his carefully constructed mask and continued, “We’ve talked about your family before in our sessions and you said that you would have liked to have more closure over their deaths. I would like to give that to you.”

“You can take people through time with you?” Andrew asked, keeping his voice flat, his face even. He knew the answer to that question already because Renee had told him, but he couldn’t quite prod his brain into working.

Betsy nodded. “It is difficult, but possible. I’ve done it for several patients in the past and I believe this could be good for you.” Betsy stopped to nudge a pebble back into the dirt on the side of the path with her foot before continuing. “However, there are rules that must be followed. But I trust you will not find that difficult.”

Andrew swallowed. What Betsy was offering him, it didn’t seem plausible. She was a time traveler, and she could travel to any part of the past, no matter how far, but this wasn’t just _time travel_. This was seeing Nicky and Aaron again after two hundred years. This was finally saying goodbye. The thought almost made something in Andrew stir. He didn’t let it.

“I’ll give you a couple of days to think about it, and if you decide to go, I’ll prepare you.”

When Andrew didn’t respond, they circled around the green and headed back to Fox Tower. Betsy didn’t bring up Andrew’s family again but she filled in the silence with idle chat about the places she traveled to since Andrew was gone. They parted ways at his door, and Neil was still asleep when Andrew slipped back inside.

~

“You should do it,” Neil said between mouthfuls of noodles. He woke up right before dinnertime craving Chinese so Andrew ordered takeout for them to share. Four containers of food were scattered between them, and Andrew was fending off Neil’s fork with his own from the orange chicken. “When you see Aaron and Nicky, you could tell them to leave the house before it explodes and save their lives.”

Andrew shook his head, sifting through the fried rice for another piece of egg. “I can’t do anything that would change the timeline. At most, I would say goodbye and leave again. Anything else could get Bee and me stuck in a time loop.”

Neil grimaced and stole a piece of Andrew’s orange chicken. Andrew leveled him a glare but Neil popped it in his mouth with a smug glint in his eye. When he swallowed his stolen chicken he said, “Still, closure is good too. It would be nice to see them again.”

Maybe. It was true that Andrew never had the chance to say goodbye. It left him with a nagging hole in his side that dogged him throughout the years, no matter how much it had started to heal over. But Andrew didn’t know if he could be so close to them, knowing what was going to happen to them. He couldn’t go back and be helpless to save them just for a goodbye that they wouldn’t even know was a goodbye.

“If I can be fixed, then you can have a chance to see your family again, Andrew,” Neil said, meal forgotten. His gaze was keen on Andrew’s, open and earnest and Andrew wanted to resent him for it but he couldn’t.

“I’ll tell Bee I’ll go with her,” Andrew acquiesced, “and you’ll talk to Abby about the procedure. Tomorrow.”

Neil smiled. “Deal.”

~

After a breakfast made up of syrupy pancakes and eggs in the cafeteria with some of the others, Andrew and Neil split ways. Neil headed to the lab where Abby was waiting for him while Andrew walked the long, winding path to Betsy’s office. It wasn’t far from Fox Tower; Andrew spent the ten minutes it took to get there stepping over the cracks in the concrete and watching with interest as the birds hopped from branch to branch over his head. The sky was clear, devoid of any clouds and airplanes, and a light blue that reminded Andrew of a robin’s egg.

He kicked a rock with the toe of his boot and watched it skip across the sidewalk and disappear in the shrubs, scaring a couple pigeons taking shelter underneath the thick green branches. It was October already, but the leaves on the trees were still slow to change and the air was barely cool enough to warrant more than a long-sleeved shirt.

Betsy seemed to be waiting for him when he arrived outside her office. She wasn’t the only therapist in the building, but she specified with people dealing with the effects and consequences of time. Andrew wondered how well known the existence of immortals and time travelers were, if people knew about them and simply didn’t care or if it was all kept _hush hush_. He’d looked online the days before Palmetto, when he was searching for a way to help Neil, and maybe for other people like him, but he didn’t find much more than speculation and theories.

Andrew shook away the thought and raised his fist to knock. Betsy opened the door with a smile, not at all surprised to see him. “Andrew,” she greeted warmly, like she had every time Andrew found himself on her doorstep. “Would you like to come in? I was just about to warm up some milk for cocoa.”

Andrew took the invitation and found his usual seat on the lumpy couch with his back to the door. Betsy stuck a couple mugs in her ancient microwave – the yellow one with ‘time is of the essence!’ printed on it that Andrew had given to her as a joke, and the green stripy one that Andrew liked.

Andrew watched the cups turn on the glass plate inside before tearing his eyes away. He took a steadying breath and said, “I want to see my family.”

“There are rules, ones that must be followed very, very carefully,” Betsy said. “But I would be glad to take you.”

The microwave went off and Betsy removed the cups, stirring the milk with a tiny silver spoon. She spooned some of the caramel chocolate hot chocolate mix into both the mugs, and stirred them in. “Marshmallows?” she asked.

“Four marshmallows,” Andrew replied. It didn’t matter that he didn’t need to eat, or that the hot chocolate provided absolutely no nutritional benefit, he still enjoyed the warmth and sweetness of it. It was almost a ritual at this point, a cup of caramel chocolate cocoa with four marshmallows for every session with Bee.

Betsy handed over his mug and settled in the chair across from Andrew. “Time travel,” she said, “is a tricky thing. Time itself is fickle and cranky, if messed with or disturbed in any way, there will be consequences.”

“You talk about it like it’s a living thing,” Andrew said, sipping his cocoa.

Betsy smiled a knowing smile. “It is, in a way. It keeps our world running, it provides structure and keeps things moving smoothly. Like oil in gears. Even with people like me, who can grasp the strings of time and travel along them, there is still a certain rigidity to it. Control. We, not necessarily just mortals, are woven into the fabric of time.

“That is why it is so important that the time line must never be messed with. Small changes will most likely not have an effect, like running into someone or switching an apple for an orange. But bigger changes, like – ”

“ – preventing my family’s farm from blowing up will be detrimental and could change a lot more than their deaths,” Andrew interrupted, feeling irritated despite himself. “I know. The house blows up, my family dies, I become immortal. I’m not going to mess with that.”

“There are always loopholes, Andrew. Ways to get around the timeline without disrupting it. That’s what it means to be a time traveler, and that’s what is going to allow us to travel to the past.” Betsy set her cocoa on the table in front of her and laced her hands together. “Now, I know that it was a long time ago and memories can be faulty, but I need you to remember a time that we can jump to. It is of utmost importance that your past self never sees you, otherwise we will be doing a lot more than changing timelines.”

Andrew frowned. He didn’t like it, but it would have to work. “Right before the fire should work. I won’t be off from the pub for another couple hours but Aaron and Nicky should be at the house still.”

Betsy smiled. “Perfect. I will have to prep you, before we go. Time travel can be very uncomfortable to people who have never done it before. And if anything goes wrong, then you could be lost in time forever.”

That didn’t seem particularly pleasant, but Andrew motioned with his hand for Betsy to continue.

“Time travel feels a lot like being pulled through a thin straw. Your lungs will constrict and your body will feel too tight. Some people even feel like they’re underwater or that their heads are too big for their bodies. I suggest holding your breath. Luckily, the whole ordeal will only last for a couple seconds at most, and then it’s over.” Betsy leaned back in her chair, sipping at her hot chocolate. “We don’t have to worry about period-accurate clothing, since we will only be there long enough for you to talk to Aaron and Nicky. We will be in and out.”

“Okay,” Andrew said.

“Okay. Ready?”

Andrew stared. “Like, right now?”

“Why not?” Betsy’s eyes twinkled. “What better time than now?”

Andrew’s throat suddenly felt very dry. He placed his mug on the table and stood up. Betsy smiled and followed suit. Andrew watched as Betsy smoothed the lines from her shirt and adjusted the large, jeweled necklace she wore that day. He hadn’t realized that they’d be ready to go right away, it seemed too fast. Andrew’s heart sped up, in just a couple seconds he would be back in 1897 and he would see Aaron and Nicky again, talk to them even…

“What time is it exactly?” Betsy asked.

“December 16, 1897. The fire was in the evening so…seven. If we go around three in the afternoon, we should be fine.”

Betsy held out her hand and Andrew gripped it with his own. “Hold your breath,” she said, and then the ground was ripped from underneath Andrew’s feet.

Betsy was right – time travel was extremely uncomfortable. Andrew’s lungs tightened, and although he didn’t need to breathe it was horribly disorienting. He couldn’t see anything, whether it was because there was nothing to see or because Andrew couldn’t quite peel his eyes open, he didn’t know. He was hurting through the air, faster than the speed of light, he was falling, falling, falling, and then it was over.

Andrew opened his eyes, sucking in a breath of air he didn’t need. At first all he saw was light so bright it sent a spike through his skull and if it weren’t for Betsy’s steadying hand on his shoulder, he would have toppled right over into the snow. Andrew blinked until his vision cleared. _Shit._ The house, the roof intact, no burn marks, no ash coating the ground and turning the snow into a dirty slush. Everything as it was two hundred years ago. Then was now. They’d traveled back in time.

“I’ll wait in the barn,” Betsy said, breaking Andrew from his tiny existential crisis. “I recommend we leave in about thirty minutes.”

Andrew nodded, still a bit dazed from the jump. He approached the house; his feet and hands numb from cold and shock. The door opened and Nicky stepped outside, a basket propped on one hip and his free hand shielding his eyes from the sun. He caught sight of Andrew and carefully placed the basket on the porch away from the snow. Nicky walked toward him, unhurried like he had just seen Andrew a few hours before.

“Andrew!” Nicky called. His white shirt was dirty and he had suspenders hooked to his battered tweed trousers. He hopped down the steps to stand in front of Andrew, boots leaving deep indents in the snow. He was smiling but he looked confused. “What are you doing here? I thought you were at the pub. Uh, what are you wearing?”

Andrew didn’t respond, he couldn’t, not when the words were lodged in his throat. He took in Nicky’s button up shirt and thick jacket. Andrew remembered that jacket, of course he did. Nicky never went anywhere without it during the winter months and he had gotten Aaron and Andrew similar ones for their birthday a few years back.

“Andrew?” Nicky asked, frowning. His brow scrunched. He knew not to touch Andrew, especially when he was in a bad mood, but he wavered on his feet like he was thinking about it anyway. “Are you okay? If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you’d seen a ghost.” Nicky gave a little laugh, but Andrew could still see the concern in his brown eyes.

“I meant to fix the gate,” Andrew said. He still couldn’t wrap his mind around all of this. He’d been alive for two hundred years and never aged a day, but the thought of going through time, backwards instead of forward, was what dumbfounded him.

Nicky smiled, shaking his head. “That’s okay, you can just do it tonight. Or tomorrow, whichever. I’m making dinner tonight, stew with potatoes and carrots, all the good stuff. I went into town today and got everything. I was able to sell those hens I was telling you about.”

The door to the house opened again and Aaron poked his head outside, likely trying to see who Nicky was talking to. He caught sight of Andrew and raised his eyebrows.

“Skipping your job, too?” he called. “We need the money, Andrew.”

“It’s only a couple hours,” Andrew retorted. It was instinct to bicker with his brother after all. Even after so long he remembered the arguments, getting on Aaron’s nerves and Aaron getting on his. Each one the end of the world, now it all seemed so irrelevant now.

Aaron rolled his eyes. “Come inside at least. We can’t afford for y’all to get sick. And what the fuck are you wearing?”

It was warm in the house, with the wood stove burning away in the corner. The wood cracked and Andrew remembered the house collapsing, Aaron and Nicky trapped inside.

Betsy said he couldn’t change the timeline. But for a moment Andrew debated telling Nicky and Aaron to leave, to go to the pub and stay out of the house. He thought about turning the stove off completely, dumping all the smoldering, cracking longs into the snow outside and letting them cool where they wouldn’t harm anything.

For a long moment, the urge to stop all of this was so strong Andrew could feel the words on the tip of his tongue. _Leave. Get away from here._ He reined it in before he could do anything stupid.

Betsy’s words echoed in his head, _there are loopholes, Andrew. Loopholes, loopholes, loopholes…_

Nicky was chattering away in the kitchen, puttering about, while Aaron sat at the table, bent over a book. He was trying to get into the fancy university a few towns over in the big city to become a doctor. He studied all through that summer and winter, up until the very moment of the fire, it seemed. The books must have burned up in the flames too, pages curling, turning to black ash. If Aaron and Nicky didn’t survive, there was no way these books did.

_They never found their bodies,_ Andrew had said to Neil once. _Technically, these coffins are empty._

“There was a pretty gal I saw in town today, Aaron,” Nicky said from the kitchen. “Think you might be interested. She looked smart too.”

Aaron’s eyes flickered up from his book to meet Andrew’s and then back down again. There was a dark smudge of ink on his cheekbone “I don’t need a gal if I’m headin’ to school.”

Loopholes, loopholes.

“I know that, but in the meantime – ”

“I’m from the future,” Andrew said abruptly, putting the words out there before he could convince himself not to. A crash from the kitchen told Andrew that Nicky had dropped a pan, and Aaron was staring at Andrew like he’d grown two heads, book suddenly forgotten.

“The fuck,” Aaron said. Nicky fell from around the corner of the kitchen, mouth gaping open like a fish.

Andrew didn’t have time for this. The sun was already cresting the sky and beginning to sink. “I’m from the year 2077 and in a couple hours, you both are going to die. But you don’t have to.”

“Well Andrew’s officially lost it,” Aaron said, blinking like he hadn’t been betting on it for three years.

“Are you feeling okay, Andrew?” Nicky asked.

_They never found their bodies._

_Loopholes…_

If Andrew brought Aaron and Nicky back with him to his present-day, the unattended stove still blows, the house still burns down, and past-Andrew still buries empty caskets. The timeline remains intact and Andrew’s family doesn’t die. Andrew never asked what would happen if they took someone from the past to present-day, but he knew it couldn’t have been that big of a deal considering Allison Reynold’s frequent appearances at Renee’s side.

Aaron and Nicky took a bit of convincing, and although they still looked thoroughly bewildered, they followed Andrew outside and into the barn Betsy was waiting in. Betsy’s lips thinned into a line when she saw them behind Andrew, but she waited for Andrew’s explanation.

“Their bodies were never found,” Andrew said. Betsy looked unconvinced. “If we take them away now, nothing gets changed. The timeline will not be disrupted.”

Betsy said nothing. She looked behind Andrew’s shoulder, to Aaron and Nicky. Aaron was staring hard at Andrew, eyes flicking from him to Betsy as he tried to make sense of what was happening. Nicky looked scared, eyes wide, shifting from foot to foot.

“Okay,” Betsy said. Andrew let his shoulders relax a notch. Then she turned to Aaron and Nicky palms outstretched, and smiled her warm smile. “This will feel very awkward, but whatever you do, don’t let go of mine and Andrew’s hands.”

~

The first thing they did when they got back was deliver Aaron and Nicky to the lab. They couldn’t go anywhere without getting a number of vaccines first, and when they were done – they had to come back in two weeks for round two – Andrew and Betsy introduced them to Wymack. He was not impressed with Andrew’s stunt, but unsurprised. As per usual with Andrew.

The entire time Nicky and Aaron gazed around them with wide eyes. Fox Tower was far from the tallest building in the area, but it was still impressively tall to Nicky and Aaron, who had never seen a skyscraper before. Nicky was practically jumping on the balls of his feet through the quick tour before getting the key to his room. Aaron was much quieter, but the look of amazement on his face never left as he studied every inch of the future.

“2077?” Aaron asked. When Andrew nodded, he said, “But how? You should be dead.”

“Later,” Andrew said, and gave him a push on the shoulder. When Aaron and Nicky were safely in their temporary room in the dorms, Andrew went back to his own room.

Neil wasn’t at the lab when Andrew arrived with Aaron and Nicky in tow, so Andrew assumed that he was already waiting inside. It was nearly six, and Andrew felt burnt out from all that had happened. Jumping through time, _twice_ , seeing his old home, seeing his _family_ again after so long. It was too much thrown at him all at once, no matter how he tried to prepare himself, and Andrew was exhausted. He didn’t want to do anything else, he wanted to close the door behind him, take a deep breath, and settle in with Neil for the night. He could check on Aaron and Nicky again tomorrow, but for the time being he was done and he was shutting himself off from the rest of the world.

The suite was dark when Andrew entered, the only light emanating from the kitchen. Andrew wondered in Neil was already in the bedroom, if he too was tired of the day. King was sprawled on the couch in the living room, fluffy tail flicking with acknowledgement when Andrew scratched behind her ears. She yawned, stretching her legs before curling up on the cushion and falling asleep again.

Andrew didn’t feel like eating anything, he felt like changing out his jeans for sweatpants and curling up next to Neil under the blankets until morning. He reached for the kitchen light to turn if off but paused when he found Neil sitting alone at the table.

It didn’t look like he had eaten, there was nothing in front of him, no plate or even a cup of coffee, and there were no dishes in the sink. He sat perfectly still, back oddly straight in his chair, head bowed and staring at his hands clasped in his lap.

“Neil,” Andrew said quietly, thinking he must have been spacing, drifting somewhere in the void in his head. But Neil’s hands clenched and when he spoke, his voice was low, measured and careful.

“Were you ever planning on telling me?”

Andrew blinked. Uneasiness wormed its way into his stomach, making him feel unsettled and antsy. “Tell you what?”

Neil stood up from the table and when he turned around, Andrew could see how tight his face was, how the muscles in his jaw bobbed when he ground his teeth. There was a quiet sort of fury in his eyes. Blue pinpoints of fire. Andrew felt his shoulders lifting, his back going rigid with tension.

“The procedure requires a donor,” Neil said and cursed inwardly. “You knew that. Abby told me you were volunteered yourself.”

“It won’t kill me,” Andrew felt the need to say.

“Really?” Neil said. There was a hysterical edge to his voice and Andrew thought he might crack right open. “I’ll be sucking the _life_ out of you Andrew. That doesn’t sound like death?”

“You’ll be sucking the time out of me, actually.”

“This isn’t fucking funny!” Neil’s voice had risen to a shout. “Did you seriously think that I wouldn’t realize? Or that I would be fine with it, that I wouldn’t fucking care that you sacrificed yourself just so I can live for another couple shitty years?”

Andrew ground his teeth together. “It won’t kill me, Neil. I’m just giving you time, something that I have plenty of. It’s been done once before and – ”

“And Kayleigh Day died. She hooked herself up to the fucking machines and it took everything out of her and she died.”

“Kevin Day lived. You’ll live too.”

“I don’t want to if you’re not with me. How can you expect me to just move on after this?” Neil said, incredulous. “After so long of only being allowed to be around enough to see that the world’s moved on without me only to die again before I could _do_ something about it.” He paced the kitchen as he ranted, voice thick with anger. He made a cutting gesture with his hand and turned on Andrew again. “I’ve spent more time in the void than I’ve even been alive and I don’t know how to deal with that.”

“And you think I want to do it?” Andrew snarled. “I’ve lived for far too long and I’m sick of losing everyone who has ever mattered. I’m _tired_ , Neil. I’m fucking tired of this shit.”

Neil shook his head. He’d stopped pacing and now he stood in the middle of the kitchen, shoulders hunched and fists curled loosely at his sides. The fluorescent light from the ceiling cast him in a yellow glow, washing out the fine details of him. He looked like a grainy photograph, old and warped with age. The furious wrinkle between his brows tightened as dragged his glare from the floor to Andrew’s face, mouth twitching as he thought of the words he wanted to say.

“I’m not going to help you kill yourself,” he decided on. “This is my choice, and I won’t go through with it.”

“You’re being ridiculous.”

Neil didn’t say anything, just shook his head with that stubborn set to his mouth. Andrew took a step toward him but he held out his hand for Andrew to stop. “Just – just – ” he said. He made another sharp gesture with his hand before brushing past Andrew. “I’m going for a run.” He slammed the door shut on the way out.

Andrew kicked the leg of the table with a frustrated growl. He did it again, for good measure, and sunk into the chair Neil had vacated. He rubbed at his eyes, tired, too tired, and thought about going next door to where he’d left Aaron and Nicky but decided against it.

He didn’t know what he was doing anymore. He was just so fucking tired and he didn’t have the energy to find any other ways to pull himself through. His chest was tight, reminding Andrew a little of time traveling with Betsy, and for the first time in two centuries Andrew thought he might be dying.

Neil might be dying. He’d left so quickly Andrew couldn’t stop him, and who knew when he was due for another death. This argument that left Andrew feeling so drained could have been the last time he ever talked to Neil, ever saw him. He didn’t even say goodbye.

Tugging on his hair once, Andrew let his head drop to the table with a _thunk._ He stayed like that until he felt King’s soft fur against his legs and heard her quiet meow as she jumped up on the table. She knocked her head against Andrew’s and Andrew crooked his fingers in her fur, not petting or stroking her soft coat, just holding on.

It was hours later when the door opened and Neil returned, seemingly unharmed. Andrew had since moved to the couch to stare at the blank TV screen. He hadn’t bothered turning it on, he wouldn’t be able to focus on it or even hear the words over his loud thoughts.

Neil slipped in the room like a shadow. He closed the door behind him, toed off his shoes, and leaned against the wall with a heavy sigh, studying Andrew with an unreadable expression on his face. He didn’t look angry anymore, but Andrew detected the same ragged weariness he felt.

“I didn’t think you would come back,” Andrew said quietly.

“I wouldn’t just leave,” Neil replied, just as quiet.

“That’s not what I meant.”

Neil pushed off from the wall and sunk down on the cushion next to Andrew’s. He left several inches between them, close enough that Andrew could see his throat bob when he swallowed, but far away enough that he couldn’t feel his warmth. “I know,” Neil said and tipped his head back to rest against the back of the couch.

Seconds seemed to stretch into minutes in this silence, Neil tracking the pattern in the ceiling with his eyes, brow furrowed, and Andrew watching him do it. “I’m not fragile, Andrew. I’m not going to break as soon as someone touches me. You spend so much time worrying about me that you forget about yourself and I hate it. Whether or not I agree with the procedure, it is my choice and I don’t want you to get hurt.”

Andrew thought about saying nothing, thought about letting that hang between them before it dissipated. But he didn’t want to fight anymore. They didn’t have the time. “If we don’t do anything then you’re going to die again,” he said. “There are no other ways.”

Neil tipped his head to look at him. His eyes looked like black pools in the lack of light. “I know that. But what if I wake up and you’re gone?” He inhaled a shaky breath. “I don’t know what I would do.”

This time, when Andrew moved toward him, Neil met him halfway. Andrew wrapped a hand around the back of Neil’s neck and pulled his head down on his shoulder. Neil’s breathing was erratic, broken as he hiccupped for air.

“Breathe, Neil,” Andrew said as if that could coax the air into Neil’s lungs by itself. “Just breathe.”

“I don’t want to lose you,” Neil gasped. He was shaking, trembling like a leaf. Andrew grabbed his hand and squeezed. “I can’t lose you.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

Neil took a shuddering breath and let his head drop to Andrew’s chest, the tension draining from his body. He was still for a moment before he tugged far away enough to look Andrew in the eyes. “If I go through with this,” he said, eyes wide, desperate, “you have to promise me that you won’t go too far.”

Looking at Neil like this, falling apart while trying so hard to keep it together, Andrew would have given him anything. “I promise,” he said.

~

The next morning, Andrew went with Neil to the lab. Abby was at a table with a couple other people in lab coats when they entered, but Abby dismissed herself when she saw them.

“Hey,” she said, pushing up the sleeves of her lab coat and nodding at them. She turned to Neil. “You left kind of quickly yesterday. Everything alright?”

Neil nodded. “Just wasn’t feeling well. I’m fine.”

“Glad to hear it.” Abby turned her gaze on Andrew. “And Aaron and Nicky? How are they adjusting?”

Neil glanced at Andrew curiously. Andrew had filled him in after he had calmed down last night, but he hasn’t seen them yet. Aaron and Nicky were both dead to the world when Andrew checked on them, snoring soundly in their beds. Betsy told him it was often a side-effect for first time travelers, and they’d likely be sleeping it off all day.

“Sleeping off the adverse effects of being pulled through a straw and spit out in the future.” Andrew shrugged. “They’ll get used to it.”

“Mhm.” Abby looked slightly befuddled at his answer but brushed it off. “So, what brings you to the lab?”

“I want to do the procedure. I want you to fix this,” Neil said, gesturing to himself.

“And a donor?” Abby asked, her voice affecting obliviousness. She slid a look in Andrew’s direction. She knew that he was planning on giving his time over to Neil, she’d told him so after all, but Andrew answered anyway.

“Me.”

“Great,” Abby said carefully. “We can set an appointment and I’ll get the equipment ready. I know you both know of the dangers,” she pinned them both with a look “and although medicine and the study of time has progressed immensely since the last time this procedure was attempted, I can trust that it won’t be taken lightly.”

It wasn’t phrased as a question, but there was a certain uptick to her voice that told Andrew differently. Neil nodded, taking a deep breath. “We know what we’re getting into,” he said, glancing at Andrew. “We’ve already talked about it and decided that this is the best decision.”

Abby smiled and reached out her hand to squeeze Neil’s shoulder. He tensed, but only for a moment. “It’s going to be okay,” she said. Neil nodded, averting his eyes, and took a step back.

“We should go,” he mumbled and nodded a goodbye to Abby.

~

It was dinner time when there was a knock on the suite door. Neil and Andrew decided to eat in tonight, not wanting to have to deal with anyone in the cafeteria. Andrew knew the looks made Neil uncomfortable, and if he were being honest with himself, he didn’t necessarily want to be around anyone else either.

Neil got up to open the door, and Nicky poked his head inside to find Andrew on seated on the couch. “There you are!” he said, and looked Neil up and down. “And who’s this sweetie?”

“Neil,” Andrew grunted. “Come in and shut the door behind you.”

Aaron shoved past Nicky, looking groggy and rumpled from sleep. Heavy bags under his eyes told him he still wasn’t finished sleeping off the time travel. He ignored Neil completely and slumped in one of the chairs at the kitchen table. Nicky snorted and mimed sleeping before plopping down on the couch next to Andrew.

“I like the future,” he said, stretching out his feet and folding his hands behind his head. “It’s super nice. Loud, but nice. I like that box thing with the pictures – what’s it called? Aaron?”

“A television,” Aaron mumbled, half asleep, eyes closed and chin propped up in his hand. “You’re loud, Nicky. The future suits you.”

“What’s new.” Nicky shrugged and nearly toppled over when Andrew pushed his feet off the coffee table. Nicky didn’t seem to mind. He eyed Neil, a little more than curiously, and said, “Are you an immortal thing too? A time traveler?”

“Void walker,” Neil said, still standing by the door.

“Oh? That sounds interesting. What do you do?”

“Die a lot.”

Nicky blanked, for once in his life at a loss for words. He laughed a little, glancing at Andrew to see if it was a joke and when he didn’t get a response he grimaced. “Oh, um.” He looked to Aaron for help but Aaron was asleep. He rallied quickly. “How long have you two known each other?”

“We’ve been together for eighty-two years,” Andrew said. Nicky’s eyes bulged, his mouth dropping open into a wide _O_.

“Together? As in…involved? Partners?” he asked, almost a whisper. Andrew wasn’t surprised that was the part he focused on, rather than Andrew has been alive for over eighty years and still looks to be in his mid-twenties. When Andrew nodded, he gasped. “That’s allowed?”

“Welcomed,” Andrew said, and Nicky looked like he was about to cry. Andrew made a mental note to tell him about pride later.

“I love the future,” he declared, slumping back into the couch with a loud sigh.

Turns out, Nicky also loved Chinese takeout. Aaron woke up at the smell of food and devoured two and a half cartons of orange chicken by himself. Nicky chattered away as they ate, asking questions about Andrew’s life since 1897 and what is was like being an immortal. He avoided the topic of Neil’s deaths, and Neil seemed to appreciate that. Instead he badgered Neil for information about Andrew and what it was like being with him.

“He used to have the _worst_ sleeping habits,” Nicky said, shaking his head. “I would wake up hours before sunrise to find him bothering the chickens in the coup.” He leaned forward with his hand shielding his mouth as if he were telling a secret. He lowered his voice into a fake-whisper. “He won’t admit it but I know he found it amusing to try and catch them. I don’t know _how_ he didn’t lose any fingers to those beasts.”

Neil laughed, darting a look at Andrew. Andrew pretended to be annoyed, but he couldn’t be, really. He didn’t think Aaron or Nicky could get on his nerves, not after missing them for two hundred years. Not that he’d tell them that. He wouldn’t want them to think they could start getting away with things, now would he.

Halfway through dinner, Andrew noticed Aaron’s heavy stare on the side of his face. He caught the small glances he shot between him and Neil, knew he was making the connections. Idly, Andrew wondered what Aaron thought of it but decided he didn’t care.

When Nicky had absorbed Neil into a conversation about electricity, Aaron leaned over and whispered to Andrew, “Our deal?”

Andrew leveled him a stare. Their deal, to him, seemed so long ago that it hardly mattered. But to Aaron, that was days ago. “Burned in a fire,” Andrew said. Aaron pursed his lips, regarding his brother for a long moment before nodding curtly.

It didn’t take long for Nicky to tire himself out and for Aaron to lead him back to their suite. When they were gone, Neil sat next to Andrew on the couch and folded his legs up underneath him. “Your family is nice,” he said.

Andrew quirked an eyebrow. “Insufferable, you mean.”

Neil huffed out a laugh and bumped his head against Andrew’s. Andrew caught him and directed his head to his shoulder. “But they’re here,” Neil said.

“Observant,” Andrew said. 

Neil traced his pinky along the shell of Andrew’s ear. “Three days.”

Andrew’s mouth twitched downwards at the non-sequitur. It took him a moment to realize Neil was talking about the procedure. In three days, Abby was going to hook Neil and Andrew up to a machine and Andrew was going to give a bit of the time ingrained into his soul over to Neil. He still didn’t get it, didn’t even understand how it could be possible or how it would work, but he’s seen so many things that shouldn’t have been possible these past couple days, that he decided not to think too hard about it.

Three days. These past few weeks have moved fast, and Andrew could already feel the anxiety nagging at him. Neil only had to make it three more days until the procedure, but what if he didn’t? Andrew knew better than most how sudden someone’s death could be, and a thought echoed in his head: What if Neil never even made it through the night?

Or worse, what if he lasted the three days, only for something to go wrong? The procedure wasn’t only just dangerous for Andrew, it could kill Neil just as much as it could Andrew. All this way, all this time, only for Neil to die anyway. Andrew grit his teeth and focused his breathing in one of the exercises Betsy taught him.

There was nothing he could do now. Either Neil died, or he didn’t. The procedure worked, or it won’t. Andrew went too far and lost himself, or he didn’t. 

Neil was asleep, Andrew realized with a bit of a surprise. He hadn’t realized how tired Neil really was until he heard the quiet snores coming from him. Carefully, as not to disturb him, Andrew scooped Neil up in his arms and carried him to the bedroom. He took off his shoes and threw them in the corner and switched out his jeans for one of Andrew’s pajama pants. Andrew didn’t bother changing himself because he didn’t plan on sleeping, but he tucked Neil in and sat on the edge of the bed, wishing for the first time in years for a cigarette, and waited.

~

The day of the procedure, Neil spaced out three times before breakfast. For the most part, Andrew kept him tethered with a hand on the back of his neck, squeezing just enough to bring Neil back when he drifted. Neil picked at his food, hardly eating anything more than a few bites of toast. They decided to forgo the cafeteria that morning, and when Neil had choked down a few more bites of toast slathered with strawberry jam, Andrew and Neil dressed quickly.

Andrew finished brushing his teeth and spat in the sink, letting the water wash away the toothpaste spit. Neil was walking around the suite behind him, rummaging through drawers and pacing groves in the carpeted floor. Andrew watched him, leaning against the edge of the sink with his arms folded loosely across his chest.

“The bathroom is free,” Andrew called. Neil looked up, his gaze distant and hazy.

“Thanks,” he replied after a beat that lasted too long.

They walked to the lab, Andrew a step behind and Neil lagging behind. Neil’s anxiety was palpable in the air in the way his silence was strained, and how he kept his eyes averted, darting all around him like he was scanning for threats. Andrew fisted the sleeve of Neil’s hoodie and Neil seemed to take comfort from that.

A medical intern waited for them in the lobby and directed them to one of the rooms in the back. When Andrew found Aaron and Nicky waiting there, he quirked an eyebrow in question.

Nicky smiled his toothy grin and hopped up from his seat next to Aaron. “Hey! Matt told us you and Neil would be doing your procedure thing today. Me and Aaron wanted to be here.”

Andrew didn’t roll his eyes, but it was a close thing. He should have known that Aaron and Nicky would have had breakfast in the cafeteria, and it was only a matter of time until the gossips did what they did best – gossiped. Andrew almost regretted introducing his brother and his cousin to the timeless. He didn’t expect them to get along so well, at least not this quickly.

“So, what does this thing actually do?” Nicky asked. Aaron lifted his head from his place at one of the metal tables, and Andrew noticed he had been studying diagrams from a medical book. An intern with bouncy, strawberry-blonde curls had been pointing out the different pictures to Aaron and she looked up, blinking when she realized Aaron’s attention had shifted. Andrew narrowed his eyes at him but Aaron’s expression betrayed nothing.

“If successful, Andrew’s immortality will transfer to Neil and cancel out his time sickness.” Andrew hadn’t noticed when Abby entered the room, dressed in her white doctor’s coat. Nicky sent her a startled look. “They’d both be rendered mortal.”

“And if it’s not successful?” he asked.

Abby pressed her lips into a thin line. “Death. It’s a tricky procedure, but I have a team of doctors and assistants that will be helping me. Your brother is in safe hands.”

Nicky didn’t look any more reassured. He looked wildly from Andrew to Neil, before retreating back to Aaron for help.

“Are you going to cut them open?” Aaron asked bluntly. Andrew knew he was thinking of the surgeries performed in the nineteenth century. They were brutal and usually opened the body up to infection. Unless the surgeon was particularly skilled and delicate, people often didn’t live long after surgery.

“It’s not surgery. They will be hooked up to machines that will aid the transfer, but it’s mostly up to Andrew. He’ll have to focus his energy into transferring his immortality to Neil, and Neil will have to choose to receive it. It’ll will be quick, lasting only a couple of minutes at most.”

Aaron and Nicky exchanged a look but said nothing more.

“Katelyn,” Abby addressed the intern sitting next to Aaron. “is the equipment ready?”

“It’s all set up and ready to go,” she said. Andrew found her cheery attitude to be extremely annoying, close proximity to Aaron only increasing that ten-fold. The worst part was that Aaron didn’t seem to mind at all.

Abby ushered Andrew and Neil into a large room with machines Andrew didn’t know the purpose of hooked up to walls. Three separate monitors were set up around two metal tables. Andrew assumed they would show body functions such as heart rate and blood pressure, but he didn’t know if it would show his immortality and Neil’s, well, sickness. He wondered if immortality could even be shown on the screen, if it were a physical thing.

Abby left the room so Andrew and Neil could change into white hospital gowns, and knocked on the door a few minutes later to announce that she was coming back in. She directed Andrew and Neil to lay on the metal tables and then a stream of interns and assistants flooded into the room to power up the machines.

The metal was cool and uncomfortable under Andrew’s back, seeping the warmth from his skin and providing little comfort. He leaned his head back and tried to calm his rapidly beating heart. Beside him, he could hear that Neil’s breathing was a tad too quick. Andrew flicked a look at him and found him glancing from machine to machine with wide, panicked eyes.

“Neil, look at me,” Andrew said softly. Neil’s breath hitched and his head jerked to the side towards Andrew. Andrew reached out his hand and Neil gripped it like a lifeline. “I’m not going to let you go, okay?”

Neil nodded and took a deep breath. “Remember your promise,” he said, his voice strained.

“I remember,” Andrew said.

Katelyn was the one who hooked Andrew up to the machine, chattering amiably all the way. She placed cold sticky pads all across his chest and forehead while another assistant did the same to Neil. Andrew had to withdraw his hand when Katelyn snapped wires to the buttons on the pads and placed a something over his thumb that was supposed to monitor his heart rate. The monitor in front of him displayed a picture of his heart and all its chambers, pulsing with every beat in his chest.

Once they were all hooked up, Abby told them that she would have to go behind a protective wall where she could control the machines.

“You will feel a slight tugging sensation,” she said. “Nausea is normal, and so is a little bit of a headache that may last for a couple days. Ready?”

Neil nodded and took another deep breath. Abby disappeared behind a wall, and then the _wall_ disappeared, shimmering like a mirage. Abby’s voice as she gave orders to the other doctors was muffled, and Andrew realized it must have been some sort of glass. Neil twisted to look at Andrew the best he could with all the wires constricting his movement. His face was still pale and his expression tight, but he held Andrew’s gaze for as long he could. “See you on the other side,” he said and squeezed his eyes shut.

Andrew’s vision went black, and _a slight tugging sensation_ wasn’t exactly how he would explain what he felt. It was similar to traveling through time in the sense that he felt his entire body was being squeezed into a small space, but different because he didn’t feel like he was _moving._ He could still feel the metal table under his back, but it was like all of his insides, his stomach, his lungs, his _heart_ were being jostled from inside of him. His pulse pounded in his temples, and over his heartbeat he heard a loud _whooshing_ noise.

Somehow, Andrew forced his eyes open and the room came into all-too sharp focus with bright fragmented colors that arranged in his brain to make his heart monitor, his heart beating rapidly on the screen. Andrew forced his head to the side and squinted to see Neil. Neil’s body convulsed on top of the table, his eyes and mouth stretched open in a silent scream. Sound came back all at once and Andrew could hear the choked gasps coming from him.

Panic overtook him and Andrew shot up, pawing at the patches on his chest, yanking at the wires as much as he could in his weakened state. He could feel the pain his head receding, he stopped feeling so shaken and his organs returned to their places. But Neil – Neil was still seizing.

_Neil._

“Don’t stop,” Andrew ordered, bordering on shouting. He didn’t care that he was infringing on his promise. If this was the only deal he broke in his entire life, then it was fucking worth it. “Don’t fucking stop until Neil is okay.”

Muffled voices in his ears, a scream that Andrew couldn’t tell the origin of. The machines whirred, lighting up red warnings that Andrew didn’t need to know that something was very wrong. Andrew ignored them and pushed and pushed until his vision darkened at the edges and he fell back against the table.

He was gone, he was falling, he was lost. He couldn’t feel anything anymore.

~

The ringing in his ears turned into a dull beeping sound, and it was another couple minutes until he was able to force his eyes open. The patches on his chest were gone, but there was a circular IV in his arm and he was in an entirely new room. Andrew squinted, trying to remember what happened. The image of Neil on the table, dying, and the sucking darkness when Andrew tried to save him.

But Andrew was still here, and Neil wasn’t. He failed.

“Hey, Andrew, don’t sit up okay? Abby said you’ll be a little sore.” Nicky’s voice to his right was obviously meant to be soothing. A hand on his forehead pushed his hair back but Andrew pushed it away. He felt like he was imploding as grief ripped through his body, his organs collapsing on themselves until there was nothing left but his hollow shell. Nicky seemed oblivious to all of this. “Aaron is in the cafeteria getting us dinner. We didn’t know when you’d wake up, but we can always get more.”

“Where’s Neil?” Andrew croaked, his voice scratchy and near unintelligible. He swallowed and tried again. Even if it was over, even if he failed, he needed to know what happened. He didn’t care about food, despite the loud rumbling his empty stomach made.

Nicky hesitated, playing with the sheets by Andrew’s arm. Andrew couldn’t stand this. If he had only pushed harder, Neil would still be alive. Andrew had failed and now he was left with nothing to show for it but a severe headache. Neil was gone, and this time he wasn’t coming back. The back of Andrew’s eyes burned and his throat constricted painfully. He desperately tried to shove it away, lock it up before it overflowed but he couldn’t stop thinking of Neil. His smile, his laugh, the way his body jerked on the table like a rag doll.

“Nicky,” Andrew demanded. He hadn’t heard that desperate note in his own voice in a very, very long time. “What happened?”

“He’s still asleep,” Nicky assured. Andrew stilled. _He was alive? Neil was still alive?_ “He’s pretty banged up, but Abby said he’ll be okay.”

The air was knocked out of Andrew, and yet it was the first time since he woke up that he could breathe. He stopped struggling against the sheets of the hospital bed, he felt all of his energy drain out of him and he slumped against the pillows. His throat worked. Neil was going to be okay. They were both going to be okay.

A part of Andrew never believed that he would make it through. He knew that when it came down to it, Andrew was always going to do everything he could to save Neil, even if that meant letting himself go. Andrew made Neil a promise, and he meant it, but making the promise while Neil was living and breathing was different than keeping it when he was dying.

“He’s okay,” Andrew repeated, having to taste the words to believe them.

“Yeah, Andrew. The procedure worked.”

He couldn’t wait any longer. Andrew forced his way up, pushing off of the pillows with his elbows. His body felt heavy, but Andrew managed to swing his legs over the edge of the bed.

“Hey, no. Don’t do that. Andrew – ” Nicky tried to coax Andrew back to lying down, but Andrew used Nicky’s shoulder as leverage to get down from the bed. “Wait a minute. Where are you going? Andrew?”

“Neil,” Andrew grunted. A tug on his arm reminded him that he was still attached to the IV. Andrew scratched at it with his fingers and peeled it off. It was a lot like the patches on his chest and forehead during the procedure, except tiny needles retracted from his skin when he removed it. A voice in the back of his head told him that removing an IV is bad, and messy, but there were hardly more than tiny pinpricks of blood that he wiped away with his thumb.

Andrew stumbled, his heartbeat still pounding in his temples, and Nicky caught his elbow. Instead of shaking him off, Andrew allowed Nicky to steady him and then made his way out of the room and down the hall.

They were still in the lab, just in different wing than where they had the procedure done. It wasn’t hard to find Neil’s room, there were only three other rooms in the medic wing, and only the one on the end was closed. Andrew opened the door and went through without knocking, Nicky quick behind him with an apology.

Abby was leaning over the bed, fiddling with wires and tapping at the monitor. She looked up at Andrew’s entrance, surprise and disapproval on her face. It turned into exasperation when she saw who had barged in. “Andrew? You should be resting. Neil isn’t going anywhere.”

Andrew ignored her, because there Neil was, laying in the bed with the blankets tucked around him. He looked pallid under the fluorescent hospital lights, his skin a shade paler than his usual golden tan, but otherwise unharmed. He was also hooked up to an IV, but the monitor recorded a strong, beating heart.

Abby looked annoyed when he pushed past her but she didn’t try to stop him. Neil was already stirring when Andrew came in, and when Andrew hooked his fingers in the collar of Neil’s hospital gown, he was beginning to blink open his eyes. Ocean blue, the color of a summer sky, Andrew didn’t care what color Neil’s eyes looked like, just that they were _Neil’s_ and that a slow smile spread across his face like oil on water.

“Andrew,” he said, like it was the sweetest thing on his tongue. He reached his hand for Andrew and pulled him closer. Andrew climbed into the bed, keeping errant knees and elbows from accidentally jostling Neil, and curled his body around him. Neil shifted so his head rested on Andrew’s shoulder and clutched the fabric he found on Andrew’s chest.

Peppering kisses on Neil’s forehead, Andrew felt like he could finally breathe. He was alive, he was alive and Neil wasn’t going to die anytime soon. Abby had ushered Nicky out of the room to give Andrew and Neil some privacy but Andrew hardly noticed. He didn’t care. At that moment, the only thing that mattered was Neil’s lithe body cradled next to his, was Neil’s even breaths of air small puffs against Andrew’s neck.

Something welled up inside Andrew, expanding like a balloon. He pulled Neil tighter against him, refusing to ever let go. It was over, it was all over. Andrew felt a weight lifted from his chest, his entire body. He had Neil in his arms and they were _okay._

Neil laughed, a small relieved sound, and sunk into Andrew’s embrace. They stayed like that for only a couple of minutes, but it felt like hours. Abby came back in the room, holding Andrew and Neil’s neatly-folded clothes in her arms. She placed them on the foot of the bed and smoothed the fabric with her hands.

“I’ll be back in a couple minutes to check on Neil’s stats again, and then you can get dressed and head home. How are you feeling?” Abby directed the last part at Andrew.

Andrew stared back at her, considering. His body ached, and his head still felt like someone had cleaved it in half with an axe, but he was breathing and so was Neil. They had the rest of their lives ahead of them, a life spent with each other. It was almost too much to hope for, and it made Andrew dizzy with the thought.

Andrew brushed his fingers against Neil’s wrist, over a tiny mole on his skin, and said, “Never been better.” He was only being a tiny bit ironic.

Abby let them be and then they were alone again. Neil was tracking his eyes across the painted black spots on the ceiling and Andrew traced his fingers over Neil’s scars, proof of what he lived through, proof that he was alive and that he had healed. Neil turned his head and met Andrew’s gaze, bumping their foreheads together.

“What was that about taking me to the Exy court later? I believe you even said you’d play with me,” Neil said, a pretty smile curling his pretty mouth.

Andrew snorted, devoid of its usual exasperation. “I don’t recall,” he said. Neil didn’t argue any further, he didn’t need to. They didn’t have all the time in the world, but they had a lifetime and that was enough. It was more than enough.

It was everything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the end!
> 
> thank you to everyone for your kind comments on all the other chapters, it really means so much to me <33  
> this fic was never meant to be as long as it was, but i really enjoyed writing it, even when i felt completely blocked on how to get to the ending that i wanted 
> 
> my tumblr is [knox-knocks](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/knox-knocks) if you would like to chat or see more there :)

**Author's Note:**

> you can find more aftg content at [knox-knocks](https://knox-knocks.tumblr.com/) on tumblr! i love chatting so feel free to send me a message :)
> 
> also there might be a continuation of this but i'm not entirely sure yet


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